TEXTILES.ORG
Vancouver, British Columbia-based performance fabric developer Garmatex has joined medical biotech firm Diagnomics of San Diego, Calif., in a five-year partnership to develop healthcare apparel and linens that use anti-microbial fabric technologies to limit pathogen transfer that can contaminate healthcare environments. At present, hospital-acquired infections (“HAI”) affect some 2 million patients in the United States, nearly 90,000 of whom are estimated to die annually. The overall cost of HAIs to U.S. hospitals ranges up to $45 billion a year.
Clinical testing of Garmatex’s fabric technologies will be conducted through Diagnomics’ Eone-Diagnomics Genome Center, a biotech healthcare facility in Songdong, South Korea, to prove the efficacy of Garmatex’s fabric technologies for the protection from, or treatment of, infections. The healthcare scrubs and linens developed by Garmatex and Diagnomics will feature Garmatex’s proprietary anti-microbial technology, Bact-Out, an anti-microbial treatment that has a bacterial and fungal reduction rate of 99.9 percent after more than 50 washes.
The partners will be developing a portfolio of healthcare fabric technologies to prevent further spreading of HAIs and pathogens. Diagnomics has agreed to make a significant strategic investment into Garmatex in return for the exclusive rights to sell the products in South Korea.