Help fight the COVID outbreak with sewing

[Adam G]

There is a dire shortage of surgical masks for healthcare providers due to the COVID19 outbreak. Providence Health Systems has created a program for the community to help sew them. You can pick up a kit at your local site if you promise to make 100 masks.

So if you’re stuck at home and want to help the cause, please sign up. Right now, their only site is in the Seattle area, but they plan on opening them in other places.

And if you have surgical masks or N95s at home, please donate those to  your local health system. There is a dire shortage. Hospital systems are literally buying them on eBay out of desperation.

Remember, personal protective equipment is worthless if you have lost providers from the workforce because they got sick due to exposure in the community. Please stay home.

Finally, if you know a healthcare worker who is currently on the front-lines, volunteer to take care of their children. Schools and daycares are closed. The last thing they need is to take sick leave or worry about taking care of their families.

Stay safe out there.

[Scott Nelson]

I signed up for the Providence program in the OP.  I received back an email that a local Seattle sewing business had stepped up and so home sewers were not wanted after all.

It seems to me that there is still a need for more masks than are being commercially made.  If non-medical folks used homemade masks, they could donate their professional masks to the professionals who really need them.

So, WHAT IS THE DESIRED FABRIC FOR A HOMEMADE MASK?
I have see an article that comes down to “t-shirt” and “tea towel” fabric as the best balance of filtering and breath-ability.  Can any fabric gurus give us some specs on what that means so that we can try and order some yardage?

thanks,

Scott

[Jerry Adams]

I have some surgical masks.  The preformed ones that fit your face, not the pleated ones.

I asked the fire department if they wanted them.  No.  Maybe the Oregon Health Authority would take them.  I can see how they don’t want random masks from some anonymous person coming off the street.

They don’t protect you from the virus.  They do protect others from you if you’re infected.

In China they made everyone on the streets wear masks so they didn’t spread the virus.

I googled fabric.  Cloth is somewhat effective.  You really need that special non woven fabric.  Good luck finding that.

Stay at home

If you’re out, stay 6 feet away from others.  If you touch a surface that someone else could have touched or coughed on, don’t touch your face until you wash your hands.

[Jerry Adams]

I submitted that form but haven’t got a response.  I’m in Portland though.  They’re probably swamped with offers.

This shows how we can come together, cooperatively, get through this better than before.

Pollyanna

[Adam G]

Here’s a list of places accepting donations of masks that you can buy in stores. There hasn’t been a mass call for home-made surgical masks, but I think it’s coming. Some people are putting them over N95s to protect them from getting soiled so they can reuse them (which you’re not supposed to do…)

In New York, protective equipment is so scarce that they’re using binder sheets to protect their faces.

Please, please stay home. That means no hiking. I’m talking to my friends in the hospital right now, and things are about to get really, really bad.

[Author]

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