Covid-19: round-up of initiatives and resources

Posted on: 02/04/2020

A round-up of initiatives and resources in the fight against Covid-19. Last updated 21st May 2020. This list is no longer being regularly updated.

This is a round-up of initiatives and resources related to Covid-19, collated across KTN’s extensive contacts. You can access resources from organisations working to provide solutions here. KTN is not responsible for the content of external sites. For more details on any of these, please contact our relevant teams: Health, Biotechnology, Creative, Manufacturing or Materials.

UKRI Coronavirus hub

The UKRI Hub gives you the latest information on the work of UKRI and its community in response to the crisis.

Offers of support

If you think your business may be able to help in the response to Covid-19, use this government form to register. It could be anything from medical testing equipment to hotel rooms.

Ventilators, PPE, and other medical technology

Open Source Ventilator (Ireland) – a place for engineers, designers, medical professionals, and communities to generate and validate ideas for open source designs of ventilators that can be produced at scale.

SEHTA MedTech SMEs Catalogue of Companies offering solutions for Covid-19 for NHS – a catalogue of offers from companies, who can offer support by supplying Ventilators, Respirators, PPE, Screening, Monitoring, Digital Health Tech, etc.

Imperial College London: COVID-19 Emergency Ventilator – experts from the departments of bioengineering and surgery and cancer at Imperial College London have designed a simple, low-cost emergency ventilator that can be built to meet MHRA requirements using generic parts.

EURATEX database for face masks – EURATEX provides tools to European suppliers and manufacturers to find each other and facilitate the production of protective masks in response to the COVID-19 crisis.

Surgical MIC PPE Challenge – for submitting challenges and solutions to PPE, primarily surgical. From the UK’s National Institute for Health Research.

Cosmetic, Toiletry & Perfumery Association (CTPA) – exchange of hand hygiene and PPE manufacturing/supply needs. Matching manufacturers with ingredient/packaging suppliers, and matching sellers with the NHS supply chain.

Chamber of Commerce PPE (and more) donation website – covering all of the UK.

Interflex2000 – face visors being manufactured for sale by this UK manufacturer, traditionally involved in the automotive sector. For more information, email jimgriffin@interflex2000.com

PPE Exchange – matching PPE supplies with PPE suppliers directly. Supported by the Confederation of British Industries (CBI).

British Plastics Federation Plastics Suppliers of Products and Services including PPE – includes suppliers of aprons, gowns, sheet plastic, bottles and caps, waste bags, liners and much more.

Manufacturing, engineering, 3D printing and equipment suppliers

AMable – additive manufacturing EU group, connecting additive manufacturing needs and creators. For AM/3D-printing enthusiasts/makers, all SMEs, all mid-caps and industry.

European Commission request for AM components – your 3D printing expertise is needed

Coronavirus Tech Handbook – a space where technologists, specialists, civic organisations and public & private institutions can collaborate on a rapid and sophisticated response to the outbreak. With your help, we can produce a comprehensive library of all known resources for mitigating every impact of the pandemic.

Manufacturing and COVID-19 – numerous collaborative projects underway that you or your organisation may be able to support

Restart Project – a UK-based charity. Tell us about your broken COVID-19 hospital equipment

Royal Academy of Engineering – wants to draw on the expertise and capability among its Fellows, awardees and partners to support both the response to COVID-19.

The Manufacturer Community Coronavirus 2020 – an online community dedicated to sharing manufacturing-related advice to address COVID-19 challenges.

Covid-19 Makers UK – a community of Makers, Engineers and Doctors organised to design and build medical equipment and ventilators for hospital staff and patients.

3DCrowd – printing face shield for medical staff

Royce Institute survey – to set up and manage a database to simplify and expedite access for the NHS to design and manufacturing capabilities across the UK. Please complete if you are a manufacturer or design facility, or if you need access to those facilities in order to make NHS equipment.

Medilink UK – seeking OEMs to specialist subcontractors, material suppliers and distributors from all sectors. Connecting NHS, businesses, suppliers and opportunities.

Regional initiatives and hubs

Business Wales: Provision of Critical Equipment and Personal Protection Equipment (PPE) – Business Wales are also looking for planning, construction and implementation of additional/temporary accommodation for the NHS, and other offers of support are welcome.

Mediwales – Urgent Call to Healthtech companies to help the NHS. We are collating a list of potential suppliers for shortage equipment.

Cheshire and Warrington Council – get in touch if your business can offer Covid-19 support locally, including PPE.

Derby/shire and Nottingham/shire PPE4NHS – asking businesses across the region to donate Personal Protective Equipment (PPE) to the fight against Coronavirus for NHS, care and charity sectors

University of Sheffield – 3D-printing face shields for doctors and healthcare workers. Get in touch if you are a healthcare provider requesting face shields, a materials or delivery supplier, or able to donate face shields for distribution.

University of Cambridge – collecting PPE in Cambridgeshire and assembling research expertise.

Supernetwork SME response hub – NHS North East & Yorkshire Integrated Coordination Centre which feeds into the NHS National COVID-19 Incident Coordination Centre.

Scientific research

COVID-19 Research Project Tracker – a live database of funded research projects across the world related to the current COVID-19 pandemic.

CEPI open calls for proposals – inviting projects to develop vaccine candidates and support clinical trials.

COVID-19 Open Research Dataset (CORD-19) – the Allen Institute for AI has partnered with leading research groups to prepare and distribute a free resource of over 29,000 scholarly articles, including over 13,000 with full text, about COVID-19 and the coronavirus family of viruses for use by the global research community.

UKCRC Tissue Directory and Coordination Centre (TDCC) biobanking response – coordinating efforts to help find human sample resources that are available to support research into COVID-19.

COVID-19 Genomics UK Consortium – will enable clinicians and public health teams to rapidly investigate clusters of cases in hospitals, care homes and the community, to understand how the virus is spread and implement appropriate infection control measures.

Bioindustry Association (BIA) – key information on the COVID-19 situation for BIA member companies and the life sciences sector.

Rapid Call for Imaging Access – the Central Laser Facility based at Harwell Campus is inviting rapid access proposals to its Octopus imaging facility for research relevant to COVID-19.

Diamond Rapid Access: Call for Proposals – the UK’s national synchrotron science facility is offering priority rapid access for groups who require instrument time for projects directly related to SARS-CoV-2 viral proteins. Based on the number and nature of requests for priority rapid access, Diamond will make every effort to satisfy research priorities. Also see their freely available Covid-19 dataset.

Scientists on Standby – connects scientists with organisations recruiting overflow resource for the testing of COVID-19.

European Commission Coronavirus Research – Research projects and initiatives to tackle the spread of coronavirus and preparedness for other outbreaks.

Association of the British Pharmaceutical Industry (ABPI) COVID-19 resource – What are pharmaceutical companies doing to tackle COVID-19?

British In Vitro Diagnostics Association (BIVDA) Covid-19 Information – supporting the UK public health authorities and the NHS to ensure there is appropriate testing for our population.

National Institute for Health Research РPrioritising funding and support for COVID-19 research across the UK (click here if your study requires working with health boards, collection of samples and data, etc.).

International Society for Pharmaceutical Engineering – database of skills and resources (add yours, or view others).

PostEra – analysing and synthesising molecules that can fight Covid-19.

MoleculeOne - free access to synthetic accessibility screening.

HECBioSim – molecular modelling and simulation.

International Science Council – list of Covid-19 initiatives

Engage with the UK Parliament as a Covid-19 researcher

HP D300e Digital Dispenser Donation Application – apply to receive a free BioPrinter used for dispensing picoliter to microliter volumes of compounds directly into microtiter assay plates.

Other resources

covidtech.africa – a hub for funding, initiatives, resources, webinars, data, and more, relating to Covid-19 in Africa.

Department of Health & Social Care (DHSC) and Public Health England (PHE) – latest Covid-19 information and advice

Coronavirus testing for medical supply workers – includes employees working in critical medicines, vaccine and medical devices

Support for businesses in Wales – from Business Wales

Patient Safety Learning Hub – how is the coronavirus impacting other areas of your care or treatment? A platform to share information on patient safety learning

Association of British HealthTech Industries (ABHI) Covid-19 updates – links to multiple resources for healthcare companies

COVID Symptom Tracker – an app to self-report daily. Help slow the outbreak. Identify those at risk sooner.

Helpful Engineering – applying unused engineering and manufacturing resources: a 3,400 strong volunteer-run nonprofit incubator organization, with engineers, scientists, and doctors around the world

Covid-19 Volunteer Testing Network (UK) – supporting smaller laboratories to set up testing logistics and processes

Enterprise Nation Covid-19 support hub – supporting UK small businesses affected by coronavirus

TechNation coronavirus info hub – info for the UK tech industry

XPrize Fight Covid-19 – a collective effort run by XPrize. Share data, resources and ideas or request help.

XSEDE Covid-19 HPC Consortium – request high performance computing resources for projects fighting Covid-19

Science|Business database of funding opportunities

Folding@Home – donate computing resources to simulate Covid-19 proteins and find drugs to treat it

Institute of Mechanical Engineers – matching skills, equipment and data with needs

Business Growth Hub – coronavirus support for manufacturers

International

The Frontier Technologies Hub works with UKAid at the intersection of technology, innovation and international development.

Open Window: Local Production and Local Solutions for #COVIDaction. DFID’s Frontier Technologies Hub, in collaboration with the Royal Academy of Engineering, is building a technology and innovation pipeline for local production and local solutions, working to build a pipeline of technology and novel approaches to meet needs during the pandemic.

EdTech Startup Map – An initiative to demonstrate the impact and growth opportunities in the EdTech sector both in the UK and Israel and display areas of innovation where each country can contribute in knowledge or tech-oriented solutions to benefit the other.

Care & Industry together against CORONA – The ‘Care & Industry together against CORONA’ platform aims to bring together all of the different actors in Europe to match offers and requests, share knowledge and give an overview of regional support.

Coronavirus Innovation Map – a global map of solutions created in response to Covid-19.

 

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