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California Gets Shipment Of Hundreds Of New Ventilators From Idaho Company

SACRAMENTO (CBS13) — Hundreds of ventilators arrived in California this week after the state gave hundreds away.

In the last few days, 400 emergency ventilators have been flown into the state at Sacramento's Executive Jet Center.

"I think we are going to be able to save a lot of lives," said Mark Baillie.

Baillie is the CEO of Percussionaire Corporation, which manufactured the devices. The Idaho company tells CBS13 the State of California placed the order several weeks ago. The company says they are a new design modeled after neonatal incubators and were produced just in the last month.

The machine gauges how much oxygen a patient needs without being manually adjusted.

"You do not have to be a nurse or a clinician to ventilate without a mask," Baillie said. "You could ventilate somebody if I showed you with a few little tricks."

It also costs a fraction of the price of a traditional ventilator - $5,000 versus $25,000 to $50,000.

But why order more when the state is giving ventilators away? We called the governor's office, the California Office of Emergency Services and the Department of Public Health. With another 600 ventilators being delivered next week, nobody would give us an answer.

For now, the company that designed them is proud to bring this cutting edge technology to California - and Kodiak Aircraft proud to fly the special cargo at no cost.

"It's really in our DNA to do good. So it fit perfectly with our mission," said Paul Carelli, director of flight operations for Kodiak Aircraft.

Percussionaire says the ventilators are easy to set-up and use. It also costs a fraction of the price of a traditional ventilator - $5,000 versus $25,000 to $50,000.

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