Health and fitness innovation firm Oxystrap is reconfiguring its production line, shifting from fitness trackers to protective masks.

The California-based company said it has begun manufacturing "N95-equivalent" masks, which will be distributed to health care workers, law enforcement, food handlers, and the general public in the US. An N95 mask is a particulate-filtering facepiece – designed to act as a microbiological organism barrier – capable of filtering at least 95 per cent of airborne particles.

All the material components of the OxyStrap are designed to be hand-washable, which means it can be used repeatedly without deterioration – or appearance.

"We are currently producing and distributing – at our cost – non-disposable/hand-washable protective masks, which are equivalent to N95 masks," Dr Ron Gertsch, vice president of OxyStrap International.

"We are committed to ramping up production as quickly as possible to help slow the spread of the coronavirus to work toward safely reopening US businesses and the economy which is being devastated at this time."

OxyStrap was granted a patent for its tracker technology in 2019 and was aiming for launch during 2020.

Its wearable fitness tracker technology, embedded in a headband, charts the user's vital body stats – from oxygen saturation and heart rate to body temperature – and also provides the user with audio reports of the stats.

"OxyStrap is the only fitness tracker that provides real-time fitness data audio announcements at user-selected frequency while you’re on the move," the company said in a statement.

"It can alert the user to low oxygen levels, abnormal body temperature and abnormal heart rate which are early warnings of conditions such as heart malfunction, heat stroke, altitude sickness & other low oxygen situations."