Coronavirus: Newtown Youth Group In Mask-Making Effort

NEWTOWN, CT — Two local students have started an online fundraiser to support a medical mask-making initiative.

Rameezah Ahmed, of Danbury, and Anika Qazi, of Newtown, are students at Western Connecticut State University and the University of Connecticut, respectively. They are leading other volunteers from the Al-Hedaya Islamic Center Girls Youth Group in Newtown in The Miracle Mask Project, an effort to assemble the mask-making kits.

Each kit provides the materials to make 50 masks. Some of the kits, consisting of enough pre-cut cloths, rubber bands and air filters to create 100 masks, will be donated "as is," and more will be sewn into masks by other members of the Al-Hedaya community.

Ahmed told Patch that Danbury Hospital was already on board for a shipment of the masks, which she said would be used for both their patients and health care workers. Another promised customer is the Jericho Partnership homeless shelter in Danbury.

The GoFundMe project has raised $960 of its target $2,000, which it hopes to have in place by the end of May. That sum would pay for 3,000 masks, Ahmed said.

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