Last week Knix Founder and CEO Joanna Griffiths received a message from her brother, a doctor in Hamilton, Ontario. The hospital that Dr. Chris Griffiths was working at was already low on Personal Protective Equipment (PPE). With an uncertain road ahead, masks, gowns and gloves for frontline workers were quickly running scarce— a scary reality for many hospitals and healthcare institutions around the world fighting against COVID-19.
Immediately, Knix launched a GoFundMe campaign to help purchase and distribute PPE to frontline workers. The aim: to help bridge inventory gaps until larger government programs are put in place. Our initial goal was $50,000. Within 3 days, the campaign surpassed $80,000 in donations.
We are absolutely overwhelmed by your response. Thank you.
Your donations have gone towards purchasing 50,000 masks and 50,000 gloves for 50 different hospital partners who have submitted requests for equipment. We’ve already shipped out two donations so far— a shipment of N95 masks to a major hospital, and the other (gloves) to a non-profit that provides housing and healthcare to members of our community that are HIV positive.
But we still have a lot more work to do. We’ll continue to accept donations and upping the campaign goal as long as we have access and are able to distribute supplies.
If you’d like to help us donate PPE to frontline healthcare workers, please check out and share our campaign here.
If you are a hospital, clinic or a lab that needs extra protective equipment, we will do our best to help. We are accepting requests through a confidential form that you can access here.
Right now, Knix is prioritizing based on needs and shipping based on urgency. We’ll do this until we run out or the hospitals’ supply base becomes more stable. From there, we’ll transition to shipping to non-profits, shelters and hospices.
Joanna said it best: “This is a point in time that we will all look back on and ask ourselves if we did everything we could to help. Our PPE campaign is our way of saying thank you to all of the frontline workers that are tirelessly working day and night to fight COVID-19. To them we say, you are not alone in this fight. We thank you and we support you.”
We also checked in with Dr. Griffiths a few days after the campaign went live,
“It’s hard to express how grateful the medical community is for your donations. The shortage of PPE at hospitals and clinics across the country is real and the need is critical. None of us got into this line of work to deliver poor care, stay home or avoid contagious patients; in fact for many, this is exactly why we chose healthcare. It is a privilege to care for the sick, no matter the cause. But as times continue to get worse, we need help from those who are not in the hospital. We need Canadians at home to continue to support those whose jobs put them at risk. With your leadership, empathy, and donations, no matter how big or how small, you too are being heroes in this time.”
We are so proud and grateful for you and the supportive community we’ve built together. Stay safe, stay home, and stay connected to your loved ones. We got this.
Photo credit: Surgical nurse @simply_merissa shared on March 19th