Politecnico di Milano: SAFER: NEW TECHNOLOGIES FOR RESPIRATORY SUPPORT DURING EMERGENCIES

The Covid-19 pandemic highlighted our vulnerability to acute respiratory disease as individuals and as a community, showing how ventilators and oxygen are critical resources, especially in low- and middle-income countries, but also in high-income countries affected by specific emergencies.

The SAFER project aims to develop new technologies for the safe and effective administration of respiratory support during emergencies, especially in resource-limited settings: the device will be simple, robust and inexpensive, manufactured with innovative materials and integrated control systems. All results will be open-source and protected by a social patent that will allow them to be replicated.

The project is headed Scientific Coordinator Professor Raffaele Dellacà and involves the Department of Electronics, Information and Bioengineering, the Department of Mechanical Engineering and the Department of Chemistry, Materials and Chemical Engineering “Giulio Natta”. SAFER also sees the collaboration of the social enterprise MTTS Asia and the NGOs Day One Health and Doctors with Africa Cuamm, together with the Italian Society of Neonatology, ASST Bergamo – Department of Pulmonology and some doctors already working on the Covid-19 pandemic in low-income countries.

SAFER is one of the 5 winning projects in the 2020 edition of the Polisocial Award, the initiative that uses “5×1000” pre-tax donations to finance research projects for social purposes by Politecnico di Milano.