The manufacturer of a batch of ventilators that allegedly set on fire and killed six people has announced that, following an audit, all the devices work correctly, and not a single test led to a dangerous situation.
Vladimir Zverev, the first deputy general director of Concern Radio-Electronic Technologies (KRET), the manufacturers of the Aventa-M ventilators, explained that the devices were tested under harsh conditions and did not malfunction a single time.
On June 10, KRET recalled the artificial lung ventilators for “additional testing” after two deadly blazes in Moscow and St. Petersburg hospitals on May 9 and May 12. On May 13, one day after the second fire, Russian health watchdog Roszdravnadzor indefinitely suspended their usage. The company had quickly ramped up production following the outbreak of the Covid-19 pandemic, as demand grew throughout the country.
The same brand of ventilators made international news in April 2020 when Russia sent a batch to the US as “medical aid.” According to media reports, the acceptance of the respiratory equipment violated the country’s own anti-Russian measures. KRET has been sanctioned by the US since July 2014.
“After the fires in hospitals in Moscow and St. Petersburg, we promptly created a special commission for additional technical research of the Aventa-M ventilation apparatus,” Zverev explained. “The apparatuses were subjected to higher loads under emergency conditions: elevated temperatures, irregular voltages, and low voltages, to test for abnormal operations. None of the tested scenarios led to a dangerous situation.”
Zverev also stated that the company’s respiration devices are currently in operation “in intensive care units of Russian and foreign medical institutions.”
Last week, Roszdravnadzor completed an audit of the KRET-owned Ural Instrument-Making Plant, the place where the alleged fire-causing ventilators are manufactured. The health watchdog discovered some violations in the production processes, but did not establish a link between them and the two fatal fires.
