ASHBURN, VA — A second-grade boy from Ashburn has been spending his time off from school trying to come up with ideas to help front-line health care workers who are taking care of a growing number of patients sick with the new coronavirus, or COVID-19. This week, 7-year-old Zohaib Begg hit the jackpot when he began going to local hotels in the Ashburn area to see if they had any shower caps to donate to hospitals.

Not only did the hotels have shower caps that doctors, nurses and technicians could use as hair covers, they had stocks of gloves and face masks that the hotels were happy to give to Zohaib. After spending Wednesday and Thursday traveling to a half-dozen hotels, Zohaib and his mother, Isma Zubair, collected more than 6,000 items that could be used as personal protective equipment for health care workers struggling to find adequate protective gear. Zohaib plans to donate the protective items to Inova Fairfax Hospital, where he had emergency surgery when he was 4 years old to remove a tumor from his abdomen. For the next three years, Zohaib was under the care of a hematologist to ensure there was no regrowth of the tumor. A year ago, his doctor gave him a clean bill of health.



"He's lived there and gotten care there. His hematologist who cared for him was there. He chose to donate locally to that hospital because he's a patient of that hospital. He was motivated to give back there," Zohaib's mother said. In Virginia, the number of new coronavirus cases has increased dramatically over the past week. As of Thursday, the state had reported 460 positive cases of the coronarivus. Deaths due to COVID-19 are up to 13 statewide, and 65 people are hospitalized.

As the coronavirus pandemic started getting worse, Zohaib and his mother started talking about how they could give back to Inova Fairfax Hospital. They had heard that face masks were in short supply at hospitals.But Zubair said she doesn't sew, so they had to think of another way to get protective gear to hospitals. Get the latest updates on the new coronavirus in Virginia as they happen. Sign up for free news alerts and a newsletter in your Patch town.



A close friend who works in the Inova Fairfax emergency department told them they had a shortage of caps and that's when Zohaib and his mother came up with the idea of collecting shower caps from local hotels.

The crisis facing health care workers hits close to home for Zohaib. His grandmother works as a primary care physician in Michigan and an uncle works as a physician at Allegheny General Hospital in Pittsburgh. Both are working on the front-lines caring for people during the current pandemic.

"It turns out that not only did the hotels have shower caps to donate, but they had a lot of gloves and face masks," Zohaib's mother said. "Now he has over 6,000 items in PPE." Because hotels are short-staffed, Zohaib and his mother contacted the hotel managers directly and it was the managers who rounded up the supplies for them.