Image Credit: Kent Simmonds

By Ashley Legassic

COVID-19

Thousands of Kamloops residents come together to help neighbours during pandemic

Apr 6, 2020 | 4:05 PM

KAMLOOPS — A grassroots volunteer group has surpassed 3,500 members eager to help locals during the COVID-19 pandemic.

Caremongering-Kamloops is a volunteer team that shares resources and offers help and support during this time.

Caremongering is a national movement sparked by the COVID-19 pandemic. In just two weeks, the Kamloops group has reached more than 3,500 members on Facebook.

According to a news release by the group, the newly-launched Neighbour to Neighbour (N2N) program has formally opened the “Request for Help” function today (Apr. 6).

“With thousands of people seeking and offering help to each other through the Facebook Group, we started looking for ways to centralize the efforts so we could make sure everyone who needed help could get it,” said program coordinator Gisela Ruckert in the news release. “In a few short weeks, with the help of some incredibly dedicated volunteers, Neighbour to Neighbour, N2N for short, was created.”

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N2N is an online tool that connects volunteers to those who need it.

“Staying connected is critical to maintaining good mental health. What we are doing here is important for the people needing help, obviously, but it also gives those who are volunteering something positive to focus on,” Ruckert said.

More than 40 volunteers from nearly every neighbourhood in Kamloops have stepped up to be N2N captains, who will work to match those seeking help with the more than 150 volunteers that registered to offer help in their own neighbourhoods.

For more information on Caremongering-Kamloops and the N2N program, go here.