RIO RANCHO, N.M. (KRQE) – A Rio Rancho business may have found a way to kill the coronavirus and they say it’s as easy as wearing a mask. Wearing a mask in public is now the norm for many of us, but for one Rio Rancho company, they believe a product they put on your everyday mask may be the end of the pandemic.
“I re-thought how we could use our polymer treatment for something as important as creating an anti-viral treatment on, say, masks,” says Gary Selwyn. For the past eight years, Selwyn, CEO of Green Theme Technologies, has been making a waterproof coating for rain jackets for various apparel companies.
As the pandemic hit New Mexico, he figured out a way to use that same technology to put onto our everyday masks. He came up with a chemical, a polymer that’s made with an extract from the thyme plant.
He sent it to the University of New Mexico and Los Alamos National Labs to get it tested. “We got some excellent results and it proved out it was anti-bacterial and anti-viral,” he says.
While waiting to be approved by the FDA, Selwyn and his team have started to apply the polymer to disposable masks to donate to the community who would like to try them. While Selwyn can’t promise the polymer will completely kill the coronavirus, he says he’s confident in his product.
“I wear it. My family uses it. We have distributed it to our employees,” he says. Selwyn has already begun testing the polymer on reusable cloth masks that can withstand up to 10-washes and will roll those out once the FDA approves it. He suggests people throw away the disposable masks after two uses.
Green Theme Technologies is currently giving away a month supply of the masks to people in the community. To try the mask, send an email to martin.flora@greenthemetek.com.
