Though we are sheltering in place far from home in Buenos Aires, Argentina, we are following the news from home very closely. It is heartbreaking to see the exponential spread of the COVID-19 virus throughout the country, infecting hundreds of thousands of our fellow Americans, killing tens of thousands, and bringing the economy to its knees.
One of the most disturbing aspects of the pandemic is the severe shortage of personal protective equipment (PPEs) for front-line healthcare workers, who are risking their lives to save us all. It is absolutely unacceptable that our doctors, nurses, and respiratory therapists are having to re-use masks and wrap themselves in garbage bags to protect themselves on the job.
So when my friends Bill and Pam in San Francisco asked if I would be willing to volunteer for a Bay Area-based project to help solve this problem, I jumped at the chance to use my public relations and writing skills to help get the word out. As a bonus, we all get to work with Paul Owen of SearchLeap.
In the past few weeks, an all-volunteer group of Silicon Valley engineers with connections to PPE manufacturers abroad has created a 501(c)3 non-profit organization called HumanKindNOW to find, fund, and procure PPE for frontline workers across the US. HumanKindNOW’s Board of Directors includes current and former executives from google, Facebook, GoFundMe, and Yahoo, as well as internationally-known experts in public health, artificial intelligence, and international law.
Our aim is to provide 10,000 frontline medical workers with a customized Protection Package that will last them for two months, at a cost of about $250 per person. As of today, we have raised more than $60,000 toward our $500,000 goal. We recently donated more than 5,000 N95 masks to San Francisco VA Medical Center, and we are joining forces with other PPE campaigns to pool resources and place bulk orders for the supplies we will all need to fulfill incoming requests from frontline workers all over the country.
If you are a healthcare worker who needs PPE, please visit HumanKindNOW.org to submit a request. If you would like to help purchase PPE for frontline workers, please make a tax-deductible donation via our GoFundMe page.
Every dollar counts in this all-hands-on-deck effort to protect the healthcare heroes who protect all of us. So, whether you are a high-tech executive writing a check for $15,000 or an eight-year-old kid donating $10 from your piggy bank, we need your help.
Together, we will defeat this threat to humanity by harnessing our most powerful weapon: human kindness.