Help Medical Staff Safely Fight COVID19 in America

Health care workers fighting the COVID 19 pandemic outbreak across America are getting sick and dying.  Doctors, nurses, and others in health care providers have sounded the alarm for weeks that a lack of personal protective equipment (PPE), including face masks and protective shields has left them at a high risk of getting exposed as they fight the virus that’s already killed more than 9,626 people in the United States.

Now, they say, their fears are being realized. 20% of the health care workforce is out sick, more have died, and no one is keeping track.

For 12 days now, I have been sewing surgical masks and donating to my doctor friends and their staff who work in ICU, Emergency Rooms and Cardiology Departments at hospitals in New York, Chicago, Maine, Virginia, and Washington DC.  In addition to mask donation, I tell a story about each doctor in my social media, thanking them for our friendship and showing my appreciation and gratitude for their brave work in the battlefield with COVID 19.  

Since starting two weeks ago, I made 250 surgical masks from my home.  Friends kept sharing my work in their social media pages and soon,  hospital requests for mask donations started pouring in.  Medical professionals appreciated the fact that I followed hospital surgical mask guidelines, by selecting best quality fabric, pattern, including details such as metal nose clip to provide best protection.

One week ago, I requested help to find more seamstresses from a group called DMV Neighbors Helping Each Other Through COVID19.  I received an overwhelming amount or offers to help, but also more requests from the hospitals for donations.  

I'm thrilled to announce that, as of today, I have assembled a team of 30 volunteers from DMV Area who enthusiastically joined my humanitarian mission.  My team includes seamstresses who are sewing like a storm, ironers, steal strap cutters, glue gun warriors, deliverers, and drivers who are helping with donations pick up and drop offs in the hospitals.  So far, we collectively we made 450 masks. 200  more are being made as we speak.  Goal is to reach 1000 by next week. 

Time is of the essence now.  My goal is to recruit an army of people to help the cause.  In addition to volunteers, I also want to help ease unemployment in the DMV area, by offering a small compensation to low-income individuals who can sew that are undergoing economic hardship due to unemployment.

So far, I have funded all this by myself.  But, I won't be able continue to grow this project without your financial help and support.

Where I come from you help people, and that’s America today.  I am originally Albanian from Kosovo who left my war-torn country 30 years ago and immigrated to United States to continue my education. I’m financial professional by training but like in Kosovo sometimes you have to take on different roles to help.  I will always be grateful to America for intervening to stop the war in Kosovo in 1999 and for giving me opportunities to grow personally and professionally.  Now, it’s time for me to give back and help American people.

Please support me and my growing PPE Volunteer Team to continue our humanitarian mission, by donating money and sharing this fundraising campaign. All the money raised would be used to purchase more fabric, supplies, packaging, shipping and wages for low-income seamstresses in economic distress.  

We need to do everything we can to help protect our doctors, nurses and medical staff battling at the forefront of COVID 19 in the hospitals across America, so they can help us if we catch the deadly virus. 

Thank you in advance for your donations to a cause that means so much to all of us!

 Sincerely,

 Pranvera Boshnjaku & THE PPE VOLUNTEER TEAM