• INEOS new hand sanitiser plant at Newton Aycliffe started up last weekend, well within the ten-day time frame promised. It is running three shifts around the clock.

• Free issue to the NHS commenced on Tuesday 31st March.

• Hand sanitisers are a crucial weapon in the fight against the Coronavirus and remain in critically short supply across the UK and Europe.

• A German sister plant is also in production and plans are being drawn up for a third plant in France.

• The INEOS Board has had a daily call on the progress of building the plants.

Sir Jim Ratcliffe, founder and chairman of INEOS says, “I am extremely proud of the INEOS team who have built these two major production facilities in literally a few days. I believe these hand sanitisers will play a key role in the fight against the Corona virus and will help protect our NHS front line staff who deserve all the help we can give them.”

INEOS, one of the world’s largest manufacturing companies, has this week announced that it has hit its ten day target to build a hand sanitiser plant in Newton Aycliffe and has started producing one million hand sanitisers a month.

Hand to mouth contamination is one of the main ways that the Coronavirus infects people and there is a critical shortage of hand sanitisers across the UK and Europe.

INEOS is focusing on meeting the needs of front line medical and care services as well as making “pocket bottle” hand sanitisers available for people’s personal use. These will be produced to World Health Organisation specifications.

Sir Jim Ratcliffe, founder and chairman of INEOS says, “Now that production of the INEOS hand sanitiser has started, we are working on the fastest way to get them to where they need to be. I am confident that within a few days our sanitiser will start to be seen in hospitals, surgeries and people’s homes”.

INEOS is the leading European producer of the two key raw materials needed for sanitisers – isopropyl alcohol (IPA) and ethanol, producing almost one million tonnes. The company is already running these plants flat out and have been diverting more of this product to essential medical use including in the new INEOS factories.

INEOS takes its corporate and social responsibilities extremely seriously. Its products are important to the production of essential healthcare products from rubber gloves, to PVC saline drips, syringes, ventilators, medical tubing. Its products purify the public’s drinking water. It produces raw materials for soap, phenol for aspirin and paracetamol, and its acetonitrile is being used in pharmaceutical analysis essential in procedures necessary to find a vaccine.

Sir Jim Ratcliffe, founder and chairman of INEOS adds, “INEOS is a company with enormous resources and manufacturing skills. If we can find other ways to help in the Coronavirus battle, we are absolutely committed to playing our part”

For more information please go to our website: www.ineoshandgel.com