The spread of COVID-19 has presented many challenges across the globe, and the community is stepping in to lighten the load. West Linn residents of all ages are working together to curb the crisis and help medical and essential workers. Local families are using what they have to make face shields and masks for medical workers in need.

Jenni Tan, 45, is one of the community members working to create more personal protective equipment (PPE). “My family and I have probably assembled about 80 masks, and it started about right after the COVID-19 crisis really hit our state,” she said.

Tan and her family have been working with the Cha family and other West Linn residents to make face shields and masks, and have been shipping them to places in the U.S. that have been hit the hardest by COVID-19.

“A lot were going at first to New York City,” Tan said. “They went all over the nation, a lot went locally here. My own husband is a doctor and so he is using a shield now, and he gave them out to his friends at Providence.”

So far with donations from a local plastic company and Goody, a hair accessory company, the group has been able to assemble and send out over 1400 shields. However, they are running out of resources. Tan expects that they will only be able to make about 100 more masks, forcing the group to shift their focus.

They are now making cloth masks for non-medical workers to wear when they are out and about in the community. Oliver Knapick, 10, has been helping his parents and older sister sew masks. 

“My mom has been making a lot and I’ve been helping the family,” Knapick said. He has been assembling them for other people to wear in public so they don’t spread the virus. “I feel good about contributing to making the masks because it’s helping people in need.”