CHICAGO (WBBM NEWSRADIO) -- Thanks to donations from 4th Ward Alderman Sophia King, some local businesses and connections to a PPE factory in China, a Chicago non-profit group gave out thousands of masks to residents this weekend and is preparing to do it again.
With face masks required across the state, the non-profit group Who Is Hussain decided to hand out masks to people, not hospitals.
"Hospitals are going to get the masks. They are getting masks in the millions. But it is the common man on the street that is finding it difficult to get a mask," said Chicago chapter President Wali Rizvi.
Volunteers with the Chicago chapter of Who Is Hussain were still organizing plastic bags with masks and gloves in a parking lot near 47th and the lakefront on Saturday, when people starting cuing.
"People starting standing in line starting at 2:30 and the line, I would say, was about a half a mile long. Everyone was standing six feet apart and that line really tells me what it meant to them," said Chicago chapter President Wali Rizvi.
Thanks to private donations and connections to a PPE factory in China, the group handed out 5,000 masks and 2,500 sets of gloves to people in Hyde Park in about 80 minutes.
The group decided to distribute the masks in Hyde Park because people of color are disproportionately being affected by the virus.
Now they are going to be fundraising so they can distribute even more in the future. Rizvi's goal is to distribute 8,000 to 10,000 more masks and his group is looking at better ways to do it.
