From the first reported case of virus infection on Feb 1, 2020, Santa Clara County now has over 265 cases and 8 deaths. Even with the "shelter-in-place" order, the number of cases is rapidly rising.
People are panicking and hoarding toilet papers, paper towels, masks, gloves, hand sanitizers, household cleaners, and all kind of dried foods. And with a large Asian community in the Bay Area, rice is always in short supply. Store shelves are emptied as fast they can be filled.
But what makes the situation even more dangerous is the hospitals and clinics do not have enough personal protective equipment. Nurses and doctors at Valley Medical Center and Kaiser Hospital are desperately calling friends and relatives for donations of N95 masks, surgical masks, hazmat suits and goggles.
All 13 clinics and hospitals in Santa Clara county have not received any new supplies of N95 masks more than a month ago. The few remaining N95 masks are locked up and only can be released with special permission from top level administrators. Situations normally required N95 masks are now being replaced by surgery masks. Yet, these surgery masks are in short supply also. All nurses in the last two weeks have been ordered to reuse their surgery masks. They have been asked to spray IPA on the masks to disinfect them for next day wearing.
Last week, Kaiser nurses went to the streets in Fremont and San Francisco and demonstrated demanding management to take action to provide adequate protection.
On Friday, Santa Clara County Supervisors Cindy Chavez and Dave Cortese sent emails to their constituents and held a press conference along with San Jose City Mayor Sam Liccardo pleading for public donations. Assemblyman Ash Kalra also issued a statement asking the public to not hoard medical supplies.
The majority of healthcare workers are very concerned about the resources that they will have to fight the virus pandemic. The hospital administration in the area is planning for the estimate that 25% of their work force will be wiped out in the next 4 weeks from either being sick as the result of not having enough protective equipment or to stay home to take care of the loved ones.
The good news is that the public has rapidly responded to the urgency.
Silicon Valley Leadership Group is spearheading a donation drive which has so far within 24 hours gathered over 1650,000 surgical masks, 2,000 hazmat suits, 4,000 pairs of gloves, and 1,200 respirators. Moreover, $600,000 has been raised.
Supervisor Dave Cortese's office received donation of 200 plus masks from a civil engineering company. Donation of over 2,000 surgical masks was reported by the office of Assemblyman Ash Kalra.
At a more local level, community based organizations like Friends of Hue Foundation, led by the local activist and lawyer Jenny Do, are also asking for donations from PPE to food. The foundation has volunteers to help with food delivery to those who are most vulnerable. A good samaritan offers a small warehouse to help storage and distribution of food.
They are distributing N95 masks to Kaiser nurses (about 200 so far). This N95 mask is crucial in dealing with COVID-19 since they are designed to filter out the viral particles which surgical mask cannot do.
Some of the money donated are being requested to buy food for the healthcare workers, who are at the front line to treat patients of this deadly epidemic. They also just received 40,000 pairs of gloves and other donations are rolling in.
FHF has a trained CERT team. They are trained and certified by San Jose City Office of Emergency Management. The 31 member team are ready to assist the community in time of crisis. CERT is an acronym for community emergency response team and is designated to be community based volunteers to support the city / county emergency operation.
San Jose City has Silicon Valley Strong website that provide many important information and resources to cope with the crisis. Valley Medical Center Foundation is taking PPE donations to distribute all the hospitals and clinics in the Bay Area.
During this unprecedented crisis, we are seeing the community pulling together and showing the spirit of human kindness.
For those who would like to donate, help or need assistance, please contact Friends of Hue Foundation at 408-755-5189 or jennydo@friendsofhue.org
Also, the website has some valuable information about available resources:
https://friendsofhue.org/
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