Richmond Hill company creates 'most breathable' mask

Apr 27, 2023

CANADAMASQ

Anthony Zhao is the president and CEO of CANADAMASQ, manufacturers of medical-grade, flat-fold disposable respirators. - Steve Somerville/Metroland

Richmond Hill-based company CANADAMASQ has created a respirator it says leads the industry in comfortability and breathability.

"It's super easy to breathe once you put it on," said CANADAMASQ president Anthony Zhao, adding that you can tell the difference between this respirator and others that have a lower level of breathability. "It's the most breathable respirator on the market."

What's the difference between a mask and a respirator? A respirator has better filtration and, if worn properly, can provide a higher level of protection than a cloth or procedural mask, according to the Centers for Disease Control and Protection.

CANADAMASQ's CA-N95 flat-fold respirator received its Canadian Standards Association (CSA) certification in January.

Canada did not have a national standard for respirators until standards were introduced during the pandemic.

Only a handful of domestic respirators are CSA-certified. CANADAMASQ's CA-N95 has the highest-level breathability rating on the market.

"We think it will also become the gold standard for domestic respirators," Zhao said.

CANADAMASQ is a Canadian manufacturer of medical-grade masks and respirators born out of the call from the provincial and federal governments to build a domestic PPE supply chain.

CANADAMASQ is one of the suppliers selected by the Ontario government to produce masks. The company has a five-year contract to supply the government with adult masks. CANADAMASQ is in the third year of that contract.

Zhao said he can't disclose how much his company is receiving in the Ontario government contract.

"It's a good amount. It keeps the business running," he said.

CANADAMASQ has a maximum capacity to produce 50 million masks and respirators per month.

"We're one of the largest manufacturers of this type of respirator in Canada," Zhao said. "We will have the capacity to make about a million of these a day if we go full speed and operate at a 24-hour shift."

Before getting the certification, CANADAMASQ's couldn't sell respirators to the health care sector — for example, to hospitals and front-line workers.

"We want to provide our front-line workers, our health-care workers with the most comfortable — not only the safest, but also the most comfortable respirator," Zhao said. "If you can recall, there (were) so many heartbreaking images and stories, you know, you see their faces start to get scarred. Because they're the ones having to wear respirators all day, every day. And they're not comfortable and they hurt their skin, they cause eczema and all those skin irritations, so they're the ones, the front-line health workers who protect us, (who) suffer the most from hard-to-breathe-(in), uncomfortable respirators. So we want to change that."

CANADAMASQ's the only company that's certified under the CSA with four different sizes: two sizes for adults and two for children from four years old to teenager years.

"We're here to stay, we'll continue to, you know, to build our business in PPE and medical supplies business so that we don't lose that domestic PPE manufacturing. It took us so, so much work to build because we never had this before the pandemic, you know, as a nation, we never had any mask manufacturing, not to mention respirators. We have zero of that here in this country."

Zhao also owns a women's fitness kick-boxing business in Markham, called Hers Kickboxing Markham.

Check www.canadamasq.com for more information on CANADAMASQ.