Ineos start delivering one million free bottles of hand sanitiser to NHS hospitals

Chemical giant Ineos has adapted its manufacturing processes to develop up to a million bottles of hand sanitiser, with their cycling team helping to deliver them to NHS hospitals across the UK.

The first deliveries have been made just 10 days after Ineos announced they would begin producing hand sanitiser, which there is a shortage of in the UK and Europe, to aid efforts by the National Health Service to combat the coronavirus pandemic.

Ineos make the individual components that go into hand sanitiser but have begun producing the final product in their Teeside factory, with their plants in Germany and France to soon follow suit.

Team Ineos and Dave Brailsford have been helping with the logistical side of the operation as delivery to 28 hospitals begins and wider distribution will follow when the factories ramp up production.

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"Getting the hand sanitiser into production in just ten days was a huge team effort and Team Ineos, led by Sir Dave Brailsford have made a great contribution alongside the rest of the Ineos family," Jim Ratcliffe said.

"The British government asked industry to help and Ineos was proud to answer the call. Team Ineos is used to moving at speed but ten days from start to finish for three plants already was incredibly tight," Brailsford added. "We are all in this together and I am grateful to everyone in the entire Ineos family for their hands-on approach to getting the job done."

While the sponsors and support staff help with tackling the coronavirus pandemic head-on, the British team's riders have announced plans to keep everyone entertained on their indoor trainers, with the squad's first-ever Zwift event scheduled for Sunday April 12.

Four-time Tour de France winner Chris Foome will be taking part in the group ride alongside his team-mates, which is open to Zwift members of all abilities and taking between 40 minutes to one hour. The Ineos riders will then go head-to-head in a Zwift race.