The National Council of Textile Organizations launched a video and social media campaign Wednesday highlighting "the heroic efforts" of U.S. textile manufacturers, who pivoted early in the COVID-19 pandemic to supply personal protective equipment to hospitals. The campaign aims to persuade the federal government to bolster domestic PPE manufacturing, according to NCTO.

The approximately nine-minute video, titled "American Textiles: The Story of American-Made PPE," features interviews with healthcare workers and American textile and apparel executives.

The video "underscores the need for urgent government support of a vital domestic PPE supply chain, while also shining a light on an agile manufacturing engine that grew out of the pandemic and is fully capable of supplying our nation's PPE," NCTO CEO Kim Glas said in a statement.

"These supply chains reconstituted overnight will be predominantly offshored if we don't get critical policy solutions over the finish line," Glas continued. "There is a sense of urgency to this work and getting this down. Highlighting this important effort to key policy makers is part of our education campaign."

NCTO wants the federal government to bring back PPE production to the U.S.; incentivize private businesses to buy American-made PPE; mandate that tax dollars be spent on U.S.-made PPE; deploy the Defense Production Act to spur investment in domestic manufacturing jobs and PPE production; and enforce tariffs on PPE made in China.

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