By Jason Gabak

According to Wei Gao, an organizer with a group of 11 Chinese-American residents of the Fayetteville and Manlius area, if there is one thing that people should take away from the past few months contending with the coronavirus, it is that at the end of the day we are all in this together.
Gao said the virus is an issue that has been politicized and she has fielded questions about her thoughts on some calling it the “China virus” among other concerns.
According to Gao some of the political rhetoric is a concern, but she hopes people can focus on the bigger picture.
“The politics is always going to be there,” Gao said. “At the core we are all human beings and we are all suffering. It is a difficult situation to comprehend. But I think we all have to focus on doing something positive. We are all in this together.”
Since about the middle of March Gao and a group of 10 other Chinese-American organizers including Hui Chen, Xiaobing Deng, June Dong, Hong Martel, Emily Qiu, Jian Shu, Hong Wan, Yongxin Wang, Haiyan Yu, and Zuozhe Zhang and 34 additional volunteers have been fundraising and buying over 45,000 pieces of personal protective equipment (PPE) including surgical masks and gowns, gloves, and facemasks from China to help with the fight against COVID-19.
In part the organizers were moved to take action after seeing the effects of the virus in China and they wanted to do what they could to help mitigate the spread in the greater Syracuse area.
Gao said as many have seen, these items have been difficult to acquire in the U.S., but through her work at Syracuse University, where she works with the office for international students, she has many contacts in China which has helped secure these items as well as support for this effort in the Syracuse area.
“A lot of people where very eager to help,” Gao said. “We wanted to help the doctors and nurses stay safe and not have our hospitals overwhelmed.”
Due to limitations on the volume of items that can come into the U.S. per shipment, Gao said a number of small shipments have come; bringing items like masks and isolation gowns and gloves to the Syracuse area.
Most recently 33 boxes of isolation gowns were received and on May 7, a group of volunteers left from the F-M area and distributed them to St. Joseph’s, Crouse and SUNY-Upstate hospitals.
Gao said a number of people were quick to show their support for this effort.
Half of the funds raised came from a local GoFundMe campaign with more than 100 donors.
The other half of the funds came from international Syracuse University students in Beijing, Shanghai and Wuhan.
With this support, Gao said, relatively quickly more than $40,000 was raised and items were purchased as quickly as possible.
The volunteers have given supplies to more than 40 CNY organizations, including Crouse and St. Joseph’s Hospital, Tops Supermarket, Syracuse Community Health Center, Meals on Wheels, the F-M school district and the Syracuse Police Department.
Gao said this has truly been a group effort with all the volunteers giving their time around work and other obligations to help organize various aspects such as fundraising, ordering items and coordinating distribution.
The group of volunteers has been happy to be able to show their support to the hospitals and other community organizations and Gao said to be able to help in some capacity is a rewarding experience for everyone involved.
After the most recent distribution of materials, Gao said the volunteer group plans to see what is necessary moving forward.
Currently Central New York seems to be in a good position and hospitals have not been overwhelmed as they may otherwise have been, but if there is a need to get more PPE, Gao said everyone will continue to do what is necessary to help their community through fundraising and purchasing and distributing PPE materials or in any other way they can.
“It doesn’t matter, the cultural differences, we are all in this together,” Gao said. “We are all human beings and we are all in this together and we all have to support each other.”