Times Observer photo by Brian Ferry A crew from Allegheny Health Network Pre-Hospital Care Services loads boxes of personal protective equipment into a truck from Russell Volunteer Fire Department during a PPE distribution Tuesday at Youngsville Volunteer Fire Department. AHN partnered with Warren General Hospital and Highmark Health in bringing masks, face shields, and isolation gowns to emergency services providers throughout the region.

In a time of unprecedented personal protective equipment usage, Allegheny Health Network is making sure emergency services providers have enough to go around.

On Tuesday, AHN, Warren General Hospital, and Highmark Health cooperated with Warren County and regional agencies on a PPE distribution at Youngsville Volunteer Fire Department.

According to AHN Vice-President of Pre-Hospital Care Services Robert Twaddle, about 35 agencies from Warren County and beyond signed up to received masks, shields, and gowns.

“Even though we’re seeing the dropping of the pandemic numbers, we’re still not out of the woods yet,” Twaddle said. “We want to make sure that we’re maintaining vigilance and our EMS providers stay safe, protect themselves, their patients, and their families.”

“We have ear loop surgical masks, face shields, KN-95 masks, and isolation gowns,” he said.

Photo submitted to Times Observer A crew from Allegheny Health Network Pre-Hospital Care Services loads boxes of personal protective equipment into the Warren County Public Safety trailer during a PPE distribution Tuesday at Youngsville Volunteer Fire Department. AHN partnered with Warren General Hospital and Highmark Health in bringing masks, face shields, and isolation gowns to emergency services providers throughout the region.

“The emergency medical services providers have been working beside us through the whole pandemic,” Warren General Hospital Director of Emergency Management Bethany Anderson said. “We’re really excited to get (PPE) to the people who need it.”

Each agency received hundreds of gowns and shields, and thousands of masks.

“That’s enough to sustain them for quite a while,” Warren County Public Safety Director Ken McCorrison said.

Public Safety was given a disbursement of PPE and will pass it along to agencies that need it. “Right now, we have a stockpile,” McCorrison said. “This augments what we have available to provide to the response agencies.”

Warren General ended up with additional PPE from the event, too.

All an agency had to do to receive the PPE was sign up and show up.

In all, AHN gave out over 55,000 KN-95 masks, 116,000 surgical masks, 8,000 face shields, and 36,000 gowns, during the distribution.

The distribution is Youngsville was AHN’s tenth in western Pennsylvania and New York, he said. The next event will be in Clearfield County on Thursday.

“We thank everybody for participating,” Twaddle said.