The rise and fall of Canada’s domestic PPE market

Most Canadian businesses that answered federal and provincial calls during the pandemic to build up a domestic sector for personal protective equipment have collapsed.

The association that represents Canadian PPE companies says 90 per cent of those businesses have been forced to close or pivot to other industries because the federal government and Ontario have given contracts to a massive American company and a Quebec operation.

“We’ve got an industry that is just running on fumes,” Barry Hunt, the president of the Canadian Association of PPE Manu -facturers, said in an interview.

“Most of them are out of business and the ones that aren’t out of business are going out of business quickly.”

A major issue, Hunt said, is large PPE orders the federal and Ontario governments placed with American company 3M, which has a facility in Brockville, Ont., and Quebec-based Medicom. Hospitals – who buy as larger groups – have also shut out domestic PPE suppliers, he said.

“There was a promise to procure at the end and that has never happened,” said Hunt, whose association has 15 companies remaining as members.

The scramble for PPE began in the spring of 2020, when governments around the world rushed to procure masks, gowns, gloves and other protective gear as COVID-19 spread. The virus hit Canada with full force in March 2020.

In April 2020, George Irwin answered government pleas to help. He paused operations at his family-owned toy company, Irwin Toy, to import masks to Ontario.

As many countries struggled to procure masks, Irwin’s connections in China, along with Air Canada’s help, allowed him to secure 2.5 million masks.

That success prompted both the Ontario and federal governments to ask Irwin to consider setting up a plant in Canada, he said. He crunched the numbers and believed he could make a better mask than the ones from China for about the same price.

He received about $2 million in grant money from Ontario and put in about $6 million to build a plant to make masks in Collingwood, Ont.

With his background in toys – a constantly evolving, innovative industry – Irwin worked with others and created an antimicrobial four-layer mask. He also created a reusable and recyclable respirator mask.

Irwin said he believed Prime Minister Justin Trudeau and Ontario Premier Doug Ford when they said they wanted to create a domestic PPE sector.

But neither government has purchased a single mask from him, he said.

Irwin’s company went into receivership last summer. He could lose everything, including his home.

“I’m pissed off,” Irwin said. “We did nothing wrong, all we did was make a better product that’s been ignored.”

Others have similar stories. Paul Sweeny runs Swenco in Waterloo, Ont., a business started by his father 60 years ago.

They make components for safety shoes and, in 2019, got into the N95 mask business after signing a distribution deal with a company in Singapore.

When COVID-19 hit, Sweeny sold a shipping container of N95s in three days.

“We decided right then and there, let’s get into the mask business,” he said.

Ontario gave him a $2 million grant, he said, noting the total investment in the business sits at around $6 million.

Sweeny now has 11 machines in his plant, a massive clean room, automated packaging and robots. The plant has the capacity to make upwards of 25 million masks a month and employ 60 people. But that isn’t happening right now.

“The plant is idle,” Sweeny said, adding he wants no more platitudes from governments. Just give me an order so we can get the machines operational.”

Hunt, of the PPE manufacturers association, said governments owe companies who answered the emergency pandemic call. Ottawa and Ontario may have provided funding and helped with research and development, but they haven’t come through with orders, he said.