A factory in Collingwood produces 500,000 disposable masks every day this month and uses new technology approved by Health Canada this year. 

Trebor Rx is headquartered in Collingwood, because its CEO George Irwin lives here. The facility was created in response to the pandemic. 

Owen and his wife contracted COVID-19 in March 2020. He said that they had been seriously ill for three weeks, which helped them decide what to do to help others. 

Irwin's family company is Irwin Toy, but when the provincial and federal governments called on Ontario companies to start producing PPE, Irwin responded and created Trebor Rx. 

They began to produce a limited number of new Zen Guard disposable masks in mid-September, and started producing 500,000 a day from early November, and plan to increase production next month. 

The masks they are manufacturing use the graphene process developed by ZenTek at its Guelph Research Office, which has a higher filtration capacity than other process masks, as well as bacteria/virus suppression properties. 

In addition to the Raglan Street factory, Trebor also has a factory in Edmonton that produces the same masks. 

Currently, the Collingwood plant has 15 employees, and Irving said he will start the second shift in December. 

The mask is four-layered, one of which includes Zentek antibacterial silver and graphene oxide coatings. Trebor Rx is currently the only company that uses this coating to manufacture medical-grade masks. 

"As small as Collingwood, it is now the center of PPE's innovative mask industry," Irving said. "Our masks can compete with anything in the world, which is very special." 

Francis Dube, Zentek's executive chairman, said that the graphene coating was designed at the Guelph Research Institute after the COVID-19 attack. 

They have been working on graphene applications for about three and a half years, but turned to find applications that are suitable for the pandemic challenge. 

The Zentek coating used in the Trebor Rx mask contains graphene derived from graphite. 

"Graphite is graphene stacked with millions of layers," Dube said. "With graphene, you actually take out one atomic layer of carbon at a time... A hair is about 1 million layers of graphene thick." 

Oxygen is added to graphene to make graphene oxide that is hydrophilic-which means it can attract and hold water droplets. 

The coating also includes silver, which has anti-microbial properties and has been shown to kill or prevent the growth of bacteria and viruses. 

"This is a capture and kill technique," Dube explained. 

He admitted that mentioning graphene can make people nervous, especially because Health Canada earlier recalled graphene-coated masks made in China. 

The recall is for a biomass graphene-coated mask produced by Shandong Shengquan New Material Co., Ltd., which was released in April and lifted in July 2021.

"We were not in the market at the time, so the recall of Health Canada has nothing to do with us," Dube said. "But Health Canada did contact us and said...'We want to check the data to see if any graphene or silver has come off your mask.'" 

Zentek and Trebor Rx have completed the routine safety tests required for medical masks and, at the request of Health Canada, have also conducted tests to measure any shedding. 

On September 28, Health Canada authorized the Zen Guard disposable mask manufactured by Trebor Rx to be sold in Canada. 

Dube said that Zentek is investigating more applications for graphene oxide coatings, which may include other PPE such as gowns, boots and gloves. 

Anyone can purchase a mask made by Trebor through the Trebor Rx website. 

About the author: Erica Engel