Masks for MOMs Campaign

The Masks for MOMS campaign started in April 2020 in response to the COVID-19 epidemic to help ease stress and lessen adverse birth outcomes by ensuring that all pregnant persons in Chicagoland’s most vulnerable communities had access to face masks at prenatal visits, during delivery, and once discharged postpartum.

What started as a small campaign for collecting personal protective equipment (PPE) grew into an area-wide effort that recruited more than 200 volunteer mask makers and drivers who made and distributed masks to multiple partner community health centers, hospitals, and other sites with a priority of aiding COVID-19 high-positivity communities. The Masks for MOMs team, co-founded by UIC CoE-MCH Director, Dr. Arden Handler, and Jessica Davenport-Williams from Black Girls Break Bread, valued the voices of multiple stakeholders by ensuring participation in the campaign of diverse partnering organizations. Weekly meetings of all partners were held to make sure all were informed on local needs and prioritization of mask distribution. Some of the partnering organizations included: Everthrive Illinois, Illinois Department of Health, West Side United, Westside Healthy Start and OCEAN Healthy Start, Alliance, and the March of Dimes.

Over the past nine months, Masks for MOMs received and distributed close to 25,000 donated masks throughout the Chicagoland area to pregnant/postpartum people, children, and families.

UIC Epidemiologist and Masks for MOMS Campaign Coordinator, Abigail Holicky, shares “I am overwhelmed by the generosity of the local response to the pandemic through this campaign. It has been reassuring to see people helping people during a stressful and uncertain time.”

The campaign is paused for now, but as COVID-19 cases continue to rise in the area, Dr. Handler explains that “we will continue to monitor what is needed by vulnerable families through all of our partner organizations. What has been most amazing about this entire experience is that because the MCH community in Chicago and in Illinois works so well together, if a new need is identified, I am confident we will band together and respond again in a timely and powerful way.”

Click here to learn more about Masks for MOMs.