At present, the medical personal protective industry is witnessing a tremendous growth as medical personal protective products are playing a crucial role to combat the pandemic and monitor the patients. The medical personal protective products such as gowns, gloves, sets, coveralls, masks, caps, shoe covers, and others are facing a huge demand, owing to their immense usage in hospitals, clinics, and other healthcare service centers. The medical personal protective industry manufacturers are expanding their production capacity to manufacture products in response to the COVID-19 pandemic. Rise in the number of COVID-19 cases worldwide and the surge in need for healthcare workers are the factors expected to drive the demand for medical personal protective products. In addition, due to the quick spread of the virus, healthcare professionals associated with collection of specimens require proper protection including coveralls, masks, caps, and others to prevent themselves from getting infected. Moreover, medical nonwoven products form a crucial part of the personal protective equipment (PPE) worn by healthcare professionals. Therefore, growth in prevalence of contagious diseases and COVID-19 is anticipated to fuel the growth of the medical personal protective industry.
However, the outbreak led to a sudden change in scenario, sending mixed waves to the business flow. Some parts of the industry were hit in a negative manner whereas others experienced growth, owing to unexpected rise in demand for products and shortage of medical personal protective products in some countries.
Impact of COVID-19 on several industries in context with the medical personal protective industry
The medical personal protective products are used to protect the wearer and/or the patient from the spread of illness or infection during medical procedures and examinations. The medical personal protective products typically include gowns, gloves, sets, coveralls, masks, goggles, head caps, and shoe covers. Gloves are a type of personal protective equipment (PPE) designed to protect staff from microbial contamination, or from contact with certain chemicals, and cross-transmission from healthcare associated infections. Gowns are safe, comfortable, and flexible, and are used by physicians and other medical personnel to protect them from infectious fluids, bacteria, and viruses. Coverall is a one of the solutions of protective apparel that covers all the wearer to prevent the cross-contamination during work activities. These medical protective clothing are aimed to cover the entire body, including head, lower legs, back, and in some cases, feet. Masks are used to ensure an efficient filtration of the breath and are widely used in prevention of airborne diseases during an epidemic or pandemic. The caps are chiefly used by the surgical staff to prevent the hair strands or dandruff particles from contaminating a sterile area. Shoe covers are used by patients and physicians to prevent the transmission of infections into the operation theatre through the footwear.
The COVID-19 outbreak impacted the medical personal protective segment in a positive manner. The COVID-19 virus is mostly transmitted through the respiratory routes and supposedly by transfusions. Social-distancing is observed as an effective measure to stop the spread of COVID-19 disease and has triggered the demand for gloves, surgical masks, and N95 respirators, since masks are considered to be the first line of defense against the viral infection. Moreover, WHO, in March 2020, advised and recommended wearing a mask in public spaces as a measure to curb the spread of coronavirus. Recently, government of India (GOI) made the masks mandatory for employees and laborers working across all industry verticals such as manufacturing, aerospace, and healthcare sectors, to combat the COVID-19 outbreak. In addition, in May 2020, Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) recommended that the use of the gloves should be during food handling, cleaning, gardening, trades, or caring for someone who is sick, and while in contact with blood, stool, or body fluids, such as saliva, mucus, vomit, and urine. If gloves are not used appropriately, they can pose a risk of spreading germs, putting workers and others at risks.
The manufacture of medical gloves for health workers is one industry that has experienced significant growth, with over 300 billion rubber gloves now being used each year. The Malaysian firm Meditech Gloves is expected to begin production of natural gloves that can biodegrade 100 times faster than synthetic, petroleum-based options. Key players of gloves such as Supermax Corporation Berhad and Top Glove Corporation Bhd., and others are focusing toward increase in production of gloves to sustain the pandemic. While the COVID-19 pandemic rages across the world, the demand for medical gloves has increased globally.
However, trade and transport restrictions, quarantine measures, cross-border movement controls, and disruptions in production have reduced the supply of medical personal protective products across the world. One of the major mask manufacturers and suppliers is China, which was under lockdown for months. This has adversely affected the surgical product supply chain activities across the globe. Subsequently, several domestic manufacturers have stepped in for manufacturing medical personal protective products in several countries. The companies are facing substantial challenges to ramp up the production capacities to help mitigate the medical personal protective products supply shortage. These challenges are expected to pose a threat to the growth of the medical personal protective industry in the coming years. However, the market players are strategically planning to strengthen the production capacities of products by collaborating with other companies to overcome the shortage.
TABLE 01. GLOBAL GLOVES MARKET, 2017–2025 ($Million)
| 2017 | 2018 | 2019 | 2020 | 2021 | 2022 | 2023 | 2024 | 2025 |
Global Market | 11,460.63 | 12,471.83 | 13,422.02 | 17,882.10 | 23,693.78 | 27,603.26 | 30,170.36 | 32,553.82 | 35,027.91 |
Source: Primary & Secondary Research and AMR Analysis
TABLE 02. Europe nonwoven products market, 2017–2025 ($THOUSAND)
| 2017 | 2018 | 2019 | 2020 | 2021 | 2022 | 2023 | 2024 | 2025 |
Global Market | 1,528,922.4 | 1,631,912.6 | 1,723,636.5 | 5,868,821.7 | 2,617,494.5 | 2,485,578.5 | 2,615,077.1 | 2,793,686.9 | 3,014,667.5 |
Source: Primary & Secondary Research and AMR Analysis
Expectations from the medical personal protective industry
The coronavirus (COVID-19) pandemic is a constantly-evolving condition that is affecting all communities across the globe. The medical personal protective industry should monitor all developments and adhere to recommendations from the Center of Disease Control (CDC) and World Health Organization (WHO), and local & state health agencies. The medical personal protective manufacturer should implement all recommended safety precautions and take additional steps to avoid spread of COVID-19 within their production area. The manufacturer should follow recommended guidelines for risk reduction such as social distancing, frequent disinfection to high touch items, availability of hand sanitizers in all common areas, and provision of training and updates to all employees on safety precautions. Moreover, the quality of the product should not be affected, as demand for medical personal protective is more.
Major medical personal protective key players are 3M Company, Asahi Kasei Corporation, B. Braun Melsungen AG, Cardinal Health, Freudenberg & Co. KG, Hartmann Group, Investor AB (Mölnlycke Health Care AB), Kimberly-Clark Corporation, Hartalega Holdings Berhad, Honeywell International Inc., Medline Industries, Inc., and Zarys International Group. The expectation from the medical personal protective industry is to support governments to fight against the COVID-19. For instance, in November 2020, four major glove companies namely Top Glove Corp Bhd., Hartalega Holdings Bhd., Supermax Corporation Bhd., and Kossan Rubber Industries Bhd., contributed $98.70 million to help the government in its fight against COVID-19. Furthermore, in March 2020, Supermax Corporation Berhad has donates 1 million nitrile powder-free medical gloves to COVID-19 frontlines. They are to be distributed to Malaysian government hospitals, police stations, and the healthcare industry’s first responders, to combat the COVID-19 outbreak in Malaysia.
Post COVID-19 Scenario
As nations are emerging out of strict lockdowns, economy is expected to take time to stabilize gradually. Players operating in the medical personal protective industry are anticipated to face new challenges related to different aspects. For instance, products shortage would lead to a negative impact on supply to various countries. However, the scenario is expected to change upon increasing the production of medical personal protective products. Similarly, decision making management of medical personal protective companies is anticipated to face challenges such as improvement of liquidity, management of working capital, better management of expenditures, and redefined contracts with suppliers. Pending surgical procedures are expected to be completed post COVID-19 pandemic. Such number of pending or suspended surgeries is expected to result into an exponential growth of the medical personal protective industry along with recovery from COVID pandemic.
Recent news in the medical personal protective industry during the pandemic
The medical personal protective key players around the globe are entering into collaboration and partnership.
In September 2020, SHOWA, a U.S. manufacturer of single-use PPE gloves, and Choctaw Kaul Distribution Company announced a strategic partnership to meet the rise in U.S. demand for Personal Protective Equipment (PPE) gloves that are critical to protecting the U.S. frontline workers and citizens during the COVID-19 pandemic.
In August 2020, Ansell Healthcare Products LLC, a global leader in hand protection solutions has signed a distribution partnership with OneMed; a provider of medical supplies and support systems which has an existing distribution network in the Nordics.
In May 2020, Dow collaborated with nine key partners across myriad of industries to develop & donate 100,000 isolation gowns to support frontline workers in Texas, Louisiana and Mexico.
In April 2020, Nature Works and the Nonwovens Institute (NWI) announced a strategic partnership to produce at least 10 million N95 surgical masks.
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