BRENTWOOD, Calif. (KRON) — Nurses and other medical staffers on the front lines of the novel coronavirus crisis are in desperate need of respiratory masks.
Grassroots efforts are popping up across the Bay Area to help them out.
Reduced to limited hours and take-out orders only due to the novel coronavirus, or COVID-19, pandemic, Vicky Little figured her business, Sip and Scoop California in Brentwood, could do more than just offer coffee and gelato.
“The need is there,” Little said.
So when her good friend Heather Taylor reached out, detailing the health risks medical staffers are facing in this crisis, the two partnered up to make a difference.
Tayor is also based in Brentwood and owns Taylor’d Physical Therapy and Wellness.
“I know of two clinicians who contacted me today who say they don’t even have a single mask in order to go into patient’s homes and treat,” Taylor said. “One is an occupational therapist and one is an RN.”
A similar dilemma shared by nurses across the Bay Area who have rallied outside hospitals in the past few weeks, pleading for their employers to make more N95 respiratory masks and other protective gear available.
On Saturday, Heather and Vicky began a collection drive for clean and unused masks outside sip and scoop on Oak Street that will continue through the weekend.
Eventually, the equipment will be passed along to the medical community in need.
“Those of us in California, we just went through all the wildfires,” Taylor said. “We have masks in our garages we forgot about.”
Just Friday, construction company BCCI Builders donated 50 N95 masks to Coastal Kids home care in the South Bay, and another 250 to Kaiser Permanente.
PG&E also donated nearly one million N95 and surgical masks to the Governor’s Office of Emergency Services for distribution to health care workers and emergency first responders.
“Because we’re prone to fires, I think we have a lot of people that are sitting on some masks that we can definitely get out to those hospitals that are in dire need,” Little said.
Taylor encourages others to reach out if you can’t make it down to Sip and Scoop to make a donation.
She’s willing to pick your items up locally.
Meanwhile, the collection drive will continue at the café Sunday from 4 p.m. to 8 p.m.
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