EC thanks Polish health min for warning about substandard masks from EU

EC Commissioner Stella Kyriakides thanked Health Minister Lukasz Szumowski for his warning about the masks received from the European Union, which did not comply with quality standards, Deputy Health Minister Janusz Cieszynki said on Thursday.

Szumowski announced on Wednesday that the masks received by Poland from the EU, unfortunately, did not have a CE certificate and thus were sent out for examination.

"These masks purchased by the European Union do not meet any standards - neither FFP1 nor FFP2 nor FFP3 - therefore they cannot be distributed among the medics as FFP standard," Szumowski said.

Seventeen EU countries and the United Kingdom received 1.5 million medical masks to protect healthcare workers from coronavirus. The majority of them, 616,000, were delivered to Poland.

According to Cieszynski, the European Commission, when offering Poland this purchase, indicated that it was a product that met the FFP2 standards. He noted that independent research proved the EU statement was "a false thesis."