VOLVO GROUP UK VOLUNTEERS DELIVER FIRST 3,800 PPE APRONS

Employees of Volvo Group UK are contributing to the nationwide effort to make Personal Protective Equipment (PPE) for front-line health workers, including those working in hospices and care homes, as part of the response to help stop the spread of COVID-19. 

• A team of fifteen volunteers from Group companies Renault Trucks, Volvo Trucks, Volvo Bus and Volvo Financial Services who are currently on furlough have produced thousands of single use, disposable plastic aprons
• Volvo Group delivered the first 3,800 aprons to Coventry Myton Hospice on 23rd May

Ruth Freeman, CEO, The Myton Hospices says: “Hospices including Myton have come under immense pressure since the outbreak of COVID-19 and, like the NHS and care homes, our teams are working tirelessly on the front-line to provide the best end of life care for all our patients.  It is vital that our staff are properly equipped and the aprons, so kindly manufactured and donated by the team at Volvo Group UK, will help to protect staff, volunteers, patients and visitors by minimising the risk of spreading the virus.”

Working out of Volvo Group UK’s Warwick headquarters, the volunteers, who are all currently on furlough, have returned under strict ‘COVID-secure’ guidelines to manufacture around 1000 per day of the single use, disposable plastic aprons that play an essential role in protecting care workers and patients.

The template for the aprons was supplied by Renault Trucks France, where the initiative orginiated.  Executive Assistant at Renault Trucks UK & Ireland, Vickie Thomas, who heads up the UK team of volunteers, explains: “When our Managing Director, Carlos Rodrigues, heard that colleagues in Lyon were making disposable aprons to help front-line workers, he contacted me to see if any of our furloughed colleagues in the UK would be interested in doing the same here. We quickly established a team of fifteen volunteers from across the Group, including Volvo Trucks and Volvo Penta as well as Renault Trucks.

“There’s a great sense of camaraderie here, the music’s on and we’re all pleased to give our time to help those on the front-line with much needed PPE such as The Myton Hospices which is playing a vital role in supporting the response to COVID-19 acrosss Coventry and Warwickshire.”

On 23rd May, Vickie drove the 14 miles from the Volvo Group’s Wedgnock Lane headquarters to Coventry Myton Hospice in a 100% electric Renault Trucks Master Red EDITION Z.E. van to deliver the first batch of 3,800 aprons.  A second batch of aprons will be delivered to Heart of England Mencap in Stratford-upon-Avon, a registered charity supporting people with learning disabilities across Warwickshire and Worcestershire on Friday 5th June.