Companies are scrambling to build more ventilators (partial paywall)

In one category of product, scarcity is all too real. Overwhelmed health services are desperately short of mechanical ventilators to help the roughly 10% of sufferers with severe symptoms to breathe. Political leaders are urging existing specialist producers to ramp up production. Germany’s government ordered 16,000 new machines from two domestic producers. Others, like Britain’s prime minister, Boris Johnson, want manufacturers of all stripes to retool and help out. That is easier said than done