As the 2020 hurricane season begins in the middle of the COVID-19 pandemic, Healthcare Ready is making sure that our resources and team are in place to support any needs that might emerge. While the past 5 months have been filled with unique challenges, one particularly bright spot has been working with our partners. In emergency management, trusted partnerships are a vital resource and we have been extremely lucky to create and maintain some truly invaluable relationships. All of our partners have been so amazing in their commitment to helping those in need that we wanted to take a moment to highlight some of them!
We are proud to work with organizations that help us support communities before, during, and after disasters. This is especially important now, as COVID-19 continues and we start responding to hurricane season. While we continue to address emerging needs by assisting those impacted by COVID-19, we are also preparing to help those who may be impacted by future events. Through all of this work, we could not be more grateful for the dedication our partners have shown to helping others.
So, we wanted to share a public “THANK YOU” to a few of our partners who have shown incredible generosity and commitment in supporting the effort of responding to the COVID-19 public health emergency. Today, we especially want to focus on our new partners. Due to the specific challenges of this emergency, we have connected for the first time and built trusted relationships with a number of fantastic organizations. These partners have been wonderful in their willingness to support those in need through donations, coordinating outreach, and providing top-tier tools that help us respond!
- We want to thank Procter and Gamble for working with us to coordinate a donation of 120 55-gallon drums of hand sanitizer and over 250,000 surgical masks to major metropolitan areas as part of their partnership with BET. Their commitment to getting sanitizer and masks to underserved communities is truly impressive!
- It has been great to begin partnering with INEOS. They worked with us to coordinate the donation of over 24,000 gallons of hand sanitizer to 8 states and dozens of facilities. In just one example of the communities this donation helped, we partnered with Illinois’ NAACP state chapter president to help facilitate the receipt of the hand sanitizer. Teresa Haley, IL NAACP state chapter president, along with her team, identified an appropriate receiving location, repackaging process, and community outreach plan.
- In an incredible act of generosity, Duracell made millions of batteries available for hospitals and healthcare facilities, which only had to request the donation. Duracell donated over 77,000 packs of batteries to hospitals and healthcare facilities across New York State!
- Finally, a major thank you to the team at Topo.ai! Their self-developed geospatial risk technology helps us to identify the most vulnerable communities and emerging hot spots so we can manage where needs may arise and coordinate the generous support of all of our partners accordingly.
Through the rest of the COVID-19 emergency, Healthcare Ready is excited to build on the partnerships we have developed and create new ones in the future. Thank you to all of our partners who help protect patients during disasters like COVID-19!
