PC manufacturer, Maingear has announced that it will start making emergency ventilators for Intensive Care Units to help hospitals during the coronavirus (COVID-19) pandemic. As spotted by Kotaku, the company is repurposing part of its facility to produce the much-needed ventilators to aid in the fight against the virus.

“It was clear once this situation began to escalate that something had to be done,” said Wallace Santos, Maingear Founder and CEO in the press release. “Within days of assembling our team, we had our first prototype ventilator ready to go. Besides the lack of medical supplies and equipment, we think there will be a shortage of medical professionals who can operate these devices especially in field hospitals, so we also made it incredibly simple to use. Now we need help getting the word out to the appropriate people.”

Maingear is based in New Jersey and is known for its very colourful range of desktop PCs. The company assembled a board of advisors made up of medical professionals and experts in order to find a way to use their talents to help out during the crisis. This resulted in the development of the LIV ventilators.

“Medical Ventilators are among the most critical devices required to deal with the sudden spike of hospitalized patients,” said Deepak Kaura, a Pediatric Radiologist, Chief Medical Officer who is a member of the Medical Advisory Board. “There is a massive global shortage of these devices, so when Maingear approached me about building one, I connected them with some inventor friends who could help.”

“We are experiencing the first wave of the pandemic,” says Nahush Mokadam, Director of Cardiac Surgery at Ohio State University and also a member of Maingear’s Medical Advisory Board. “The lack of critical equipment such as ventilators is a key limitation in our response. This ventilator has the advantage of being portable, rugged, and easily operated by frontline personnel.”

And while these ventilators clearly don’t boast the absolute disco of RGB lighting that is present on some of the company’s pricier desktop PCs, they do still retain a slightly PC-ish look.

This is just one of many positive moves we’ve seen by companies in recent weeks. Sony recently set up an eye-watering $100 million emergency fund for the current crisis and other game companies are getting involved in their own ways.

Most of us aren’t in a position to help hospitals by manufacturing ventilators or pledging huge sums of money. But if you want to do something, then look out for your friends and family as best you can. Why not check on that mate that you haven’t spoken to for a while? Virtually, of course. Or get some friends together online for a group chat on Discord or a few games of ?