For Richard Lee, the battle against COVID-19 pandemic was hitting way too close to home. Lee's sister, who works in the medical field as an anesthesiologist, informed him last month of the shortage of protective equipment among workers on the front line. Richard Lee happens to be president of JOOLA, one of the world's leading manufacturers of table tennis equipment. He made a few calls to his manufacturers in Shenzhen, China and got the face mask production online with the company's subsidiary, JOOLA Medical. The process was initially slowed by going through the proper channels to obtain FDA approval. With federal blessing, JOOLA has now shipped over half a million masks to health care workers across the United States, the hardest-hit country with over a quarter of the world's two million confirmed cases of COVID-19. As current orders stand, three million more JOOLA masks are headed toward American medical workers by the end of April. "Wearing a face mask will definitely help save lives, in my opinion," said Lee. "Definitely social distancing hand-washing as well as wearing a face mask. All three of these combined is what we see in Asia that has been successful in slowing down COVID-19." This shift of manufacturing emphases during times of threatened public safety is not without historical precedent. In 1942, American citizens donated cookware and dismantled metal fences to contribute to scrap metal drives for the war effort. Now, with a new kind of worldwide war raging, MLB uniform manufacturer Fanatics is making face masks out of pinstriped cloth intended for the Yankees and Phillies. JOOLA now joins this noble tradition of wartime resourcefulness. As an added bonus, they have found a way to generate income when no one is really buying table tennis equipment anyway. For Richard Lee, however, the most important thing is keeping his sister safe.

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