It doesn’t matter how much cash you’re making at the end of the day, nor should your feelings on ultra-powerful corporations because right now humanity needs all the help it can get.
Fortunately for us, even those higher-ups on the economic food chain are doing their part to help out first responders and medical staff everywhere.
While the majority of people around the world are terrified of contracting the coronavirus, the people most at risk are those fighting this thing on the frontlines. With the rate that COVID-19 has spread around the world, it’s no surprise that medical supplies are beginning to run low, to an almost dangerous extent. While it’s all very well people wanting to donate and do their part to help in these distressing times, there’s only so much one person can do. A whole company though? Now we’re cooking with gas.
This is the case with SpaceX, Elon Musk’s sciencey brainchild and leader in aeronautical endeavours. According to an email sent around the company, SpaceX is in the process of designing and developing their own range of hand sanitiser and face masks with the intention of donating them all to hospitals and locations placed under severe strain.
According to the memo, first seen by CNBC and then The Verge, SpaceX’s hand sanitiser has been created through the collaboration of several internal teams and “complies with CDC guidelines and is effective at killing COVID-19.” The face mask (or face shields, as they’re referred to in the memo which is a way cooler name) are being developed by the same teams that make spacesuits and helmets for SpaceX, so they’re probably incredibly secure.
While this is great news to come out of SpaceX, we feel that it’s important to point out the irony that not two weeks ago, SpaceX boss Elon Musk downplayed the severity of the pandemic and told employees that they were more likely to die in a car crash than the coronavirus. Several SpaceX employees have now officially been quarantined and two have tested positive for the virus. Since then, Musk’s other company Tesla has been donating thousands of dollars in equipment to hospitals in California.
Another company trying to do their part in all of this chaos is Nintendo, who has reportedly donated 9,500 face masks to local responders in the state of Washington. Initially purchased for “emergency preparedness planning”, Nintendo probably figured that they needed those masks for less than those actually out there fighting COVID-19.
The trend of companies donating to medical staff during the worsening pandemic in the United States can also be been seen in the multitude of donations from GM, Ford, Apple and Facebook who are all doing their part to try and make the situation a little easier for all those involved.