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Trained repair professionals at hospitals are regularly unable to fix medical devices because of manufacturer lockout codes or the inability to obtain repair parts. During the early days of the COVID-19 pandemic, broken ventilators sat unrepaired for weeks or months as manufacturers were overwhelmed with repair requests and independent repair professionals were locked out of them. At the time, I reported that independent repair techs had resorted to creating DIY dongles loaded with jailbroken Ukrainian firmware to fix ventilators without manufacturer permission. Medical device manufacturers also threatened iFixit because it posted ventilator repair manuals on its website. I have also written about people with sleep apnea who have hacked their CPAP machines to improve their basic functionality and to repair them.
PS: he got it repaired.
Corporations are a fucking curse.
This is what Louis Rossmann has been screaming and fighting about for years. It’s the most fucked up shit ever. It is affecting our food supplies and we are not paying attention to it.
there is absolutely no excuse for this
corporations are a problem we need to solve as a society.
Orrrr and hear me out. We just pass a national right to repair law.
There, problem fixed and we don’t need to burn anything!
aaaww but I already got my gas can and matches out
Reasonable people always ruin everyone’s fun.
any company who locks medical device repair should be burned to the ground. and dont bullshit me about liabilities bla it is more likely cash grab which they get in the form of “extra care packages” or exorbitant repair prices charged after the guarantee period ends.





