As the pandemic unfolds with an uncertain outcome, US securities analysts that cover publicly traded medtech companies are developing mathematical models to estimate the impact of the COVID-19 pandemic on medtech companies.

American auto giant General Motors Co. announced late on 20 March that it has teamed up with Seattle-based Ventec Life Systems to manufacture much-needed medical ventilators as the US braces for a strained health care system from COVID-19.

Two Hogan Lovells attorneys say the medical device industry is jittery about President Trump’s 18 March invocation of the Defense Production Act. That’s because the DPA gives the government broad authority to, among other things, order manufacturers to make particular products in a time of great national need. That can be a problem if those companies can’t make complex products like ventilators – or don’t make devices in the first place. After all, “we’re not making hubcaps. We’re making important devices,” Hogan Lovells partner Mike Heyl tells Medtech Insight.