Woman helps feed healthcare workers at Weiss Hospital, supports local restaurants at same time

CHICAGO (WLS) -- Roughly 150 meat pies were delivered to Uptown's Weiss Memorial Hospital Monday, enough to feed the entire staff. A second delivery will come with dinner for the night shift.

"The sirens just kept coming and just felt so useless so I called over to the hospital, and I said 'what can I do to help?,'" said Susan Gold. "I thought my $40 is not going to go that far, so I started a neighborhood gofundme, and it's to feed the neighborhood heroes.

But Gold didn't stop there.

After raising more than $6,500, she decided to order every meal from a different neighborhood restaurant struggling to stay alive during this crisis.

Monday's lunch was catered by Barangaroos in Lakeview.

"I'm trying to spread it around as best I can, I only have $1,000 budget per meal so doing the best with the money I'm raising," Gold said.

For the restaurants fulfilling the order is a lifeline. For the healthcare workers on the receiving end of those meals, it's a bright spot in an otherwise long and stressful day.

"As this started coming down the line we had one COVID floor, then we had two, then we had three, then we had four and now we have 8 units of COVID, and ICU, a backup ICU and an ER," said Terry Touhy, a chaplain at Weiss Memorial Hospital.

"The food is one bright spot. It's a connection to the outside world that none of us seem to have. We work 12-hour shifts. They come in when it's dark. They leave when it's dark," Touhy said.

Gold's goal is to raise enough money to continue feeding the staff at Weiss Hospital for as long as she can, but at the very least through the end of the week.