KC volunteers stitch hundreds of cloth masks for medical workers fighting coronavirus
All across the metro, home sewers with sore backs and fingers are hunched over their dining room and kitchen tables cutting fabric and old shirts into long rectangular pieces.
They’re making surgical masks for the coronavirus emergency.
This fast-growing army is sewing faster than it’s taking hospitals to decide whether they need the masks or can even use them, out of concern for their effectiveness. But there are plenty of other medical providers who can — one local OB-GYN is sewing some for her staff — and these volunteers report requests are rolling in.
On Monday, Heart to Heart International began accepting donations of masks — all kinds, including cloth masks — at its headquarters in Lenexa. The nonprofit humanitarian organization has a trailer set up at 11550 Renner Boulevard.
Also on Monday, Johnson County’s emergency management team sent out a call.
“As Johnson County continues to respond to the coronavirus (COVID-19) pandemic, we are now seeking donated cloth masks to build the supply of personal protective equipment that’s in need,” said the notice, inviting people to drop off masks at the county’s administration building in Olathe.
The cloth masks are a last resort if a catastrophic shortage hits.
“We are continuing to request masks from different sources,” said Alyson Angell, public information officer for MED-ACT, Emergency Medical Services. “We are not to a point yet where we are going to our backup masks or anything like that. We hope to not actually have to use the cloth masks at all.
“However, if we get to the point where those surgical masks ... are no longer available, the cloth masks are better than no mask at all when it comes to protecting our patients and responders.”
She said former patients who have ridden in their ambulances are calling, offering to sew masks for the department.
“It gives people a sense of community, and we truly appreciate that,” Angell said. “There’s no way we can repay the amount of generosity that we’ve seen in just a short time.”
Some of the sewers have family members in the medical field whom they worry about.
“They’re on the front line, and if they’re down, what are we going to do?” said Maria Herrera of Overland Park, who set up a Facebook group called Sew Masks for KC. “They’re waiting for the mask orders to come, but that’s going to take a few weeks.
“So we can sit around and watch Netflix or we can sit around and cut fabric. We can do both. I’ve done it.”
The nurse who heard the call
Brandi Thomas-Astry, a registered nurse at an outpatient radiation oncology clinic, has been on spring break at home. A few days ago she got a group text from her colleagues, more than 100 comments in all, “and I could kinda sense the anxiety of everyone,” she said.
“There were decisions being made about whether we should put masks on patients. They come in every day. Do you mask each patient every day when supplies are low, or do you use those on staff? So there’s just a lot of discussion about it.”
Masks in her clinic are “always kinda around when we need them. If we have a sick patient, then we can always put one on them. But it’s not a clinic where they’re in abundance, ever.”
Now she’s in a situation she’s never seen in her 16-year career.
“When I became a nurse I never thought I would be sitting at home sewing face masks for my co-workers on my days off,” she wrote on Facebook. “I mean, don’t we live in the 21st century where all members of healthcare are properly equipped with PPE (personal protection equipment)?
“Insert Coronavirus.
“Now I hear my work family voicing fears for their safety/health and that of their family when supplies are extremely limited.”
She saw a social media post about a hospital south of Kansas City accepting handmade masks, “so that was kind of in my thought.”
Then she saw that an OB-GYN she knows was sewing masks for her staff, “and that kind of lit a fire under me. This is something I can do. I’m out of work right now. I have tons of supplies sitting around at home right now. And it just kind of started from there.”
She put together what she learned in nursing school about infectious diseases and her junior high home economics training. She decided the mask should be washable and reusable, something that could be thrown in the laundry at a high temperature or an autoclave sterilizing machine.
She gathered old shirts from family members, and a co-worker gave her seven boxes of fabric from an aunt who had died. “And that was really helpful because loose fabric is easier to cut than old clothing,” she said.
She doesn’t consider herself a sewer. “It’s not a skill I keep up on,” said the nurse, who lives in eastern Jackson County. “And as I’ve been doing these masks, I’ve been getting better and more efficient. The first day I did 14, the second day I did 35 and then yesterday I did 83. I’m finding a rhythm.
“I have my clinic pretty much covered as of yesterday.”
Who is collecting masks
People want to help. They’ve been asking the Olathe Health system what supplies they can donate, about providing food or coffee for health care workers, and donating homemade masks.
“We are currently working out the process for the face masks to make sure they meet the needed requirements, and will be communicating that out soon,” a spokeswoman said Tuesday.
A spokeswoman for St. Joseph Medical Center, which is reviewing information about cloth masks from the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention, said the hospital can’t use them right now.
The CDC’s guidance on face masks used by health care professionals says workers “might” use homemade masks — bandannas and scarves, for example — “for care of patients with COVID-19 as a last resort.
“However, homemade masks are not considered PPE, since their capability to protect (health care professionals) is unknown. Caution should be exercised when considering this option.”
“This is not a replacement for anything we have on hand,” said Angell with MED-ACT. “This is should we get to a point where we don’t have anything. This is where it’s going to be.”
She said people had already dropped off masks at the county offices on Tuesday morning. She said among the slew of questions people had was surprise that an ambulance service uses them at all.
Surgical masks and the more protective N95masks are in the ambulances at all times, she said.
“These are not just used during COVID-19,” said Angell. “These are used during the flu season. And it’s not just to protect us, it’s to protect our patient as well.”
She said that both styles of masks have been on back order since January, “and that was because this was already happening in other parts of the world that were affected by COVID-19.
“We’re looking ahead. We’re doing contingency planning.”
So is Shana Ayers in Olathe. She and her sister set up the Mask Connections Facebook group that nearly 150 people have joined in recent days. Ayers is an autism specialist who works for the Olathe school district. Her sister is a nurse.
The sisters began making cloth masks for the health care workers and residents at a local organization that works with developmentally disabled clients.
“And then word kinda got out into the medical community,” she said. “Initially we were getting orders of 50 masks. Then it jumped to, ‘Hey, can we have 100?’ We jumped all the way to 600.
“We’re a little over our heads.”
They’ve called in help from a local Boy Scout troop that is measuring and cutting strips of fabric. She joked that it’s called “home-schooling.”
The top floor of her townhouse “is covered in all things masks,” she said. “It’s literally been a sweat shop in my house. I literally get up and sew until the time I go to bed.”
She estimates the group has collectively made at least 500 in the last few days. Some of the masks went to three hospitals in town, others to a few pediatrician offices that have accepted them.
Herrera started marshaling volunteers when she saw nurses on Facebook Marketplace asking people to make masks for their clinics. Since then she’s been organizing volunteers, answering questions and driving around town picking up boxes of donated fabric that people are setting out on their front porches.
People have even been offering their extra sewing machines to others who don’t have one, she said.
On Tuesday afternoon, Herrera said she received a request on Facebook from a man saying that his client is a “major hospital.”
He needed 1,000 masks.
“We are cutting up bed sheets,” she said, laughing. “I don’t know how to meet (their) needs.”
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