PEOPLE: MAKE MASKS. PROVIDERS: ACCEPT THEM.

I’m getting emails all the time about hospitals and other care-giving entities who are asking people to make homemade masks.  The only place I’m not hearing about that is among our local D.C. provider agencies under the DDS waiver.  But I know, from personal experience, that DSPs are not all having masks issued to them by their agency – and I for one am not happy about this.  If folks are waiting for N95s to magically appear, or expecting the D.C. government to issue masks, that really is not good enough.  We all know there isn’t enough personal protective equipment out there, so homemade masks are the only available backup.  It’s better than nothing, folks, and there’s really no reason whatever for our local provider agencies not to be asking, loudly and right now, for people to be making them.  All you have to do is let folks know who to send them to.  I’m talking with several others right now about this, and we will get a coordination point set up very shortly to collect this information from providers.  In the meantime, I’m making masks.  They won’t be perfect, but they may help protect my son and those around him, and that’s good enough for me.