For nearly two weeks, Luba Drozd has barely slept.
“I feel guilty about sleeping when doctors are in danger,” said Drozd, a 38-year-old Brooklyn artist who’s been using a 3D printer to churn out plastic face shields day and night for Big Apple healthcare workers.
“I wake up around 8 a.m. and I go to sleep around 3 or 4 a.m. Sometimes, I wake up in the middle of the night to finish printing and start a new one.”
Ever since the coronavirus pandemic came knocking at New York’s door, plunging the five boroughs into the epicenter of the crisis, Drozd has used her background in 3D motion graphics and her own 3D printers to make supplies for healthcare workers grappling with a nationwide shortage of protective gear.
“I saw an article about an Italian teen who 3D printed for hospitals in Italy because the situation is so dire. I thought that the situation would be just as dire here, and I looked on forums within the 3D printing communities [to find designs,]” Drozd said.
“I never thought I would be making things for the medical field or during a pandemic. I wanted to do the right thing for everyone. It seems like I had the tools to help and that’s what I wanted to do.”
As word of her project spread on social media, Drozd recruited more than two dozen volunteers to help and together they’ve delivered nearly 200 of the sorely needed shields to hospitals across the city to thankful healthcare workers.
“A doctor wrote to me saying, ‘you are truly saving lives, we are so grateful to you,’” Drozd said.
She asked that The Post not name the hospitals she’s sending supplies to because healthcare workers are afraid of getting in trouble for admitting their infirmaries don’t have enough personal protective equipment to keep them safe.
When Drozd’s friends heard about what she was doing, they set up a GoFundMe page to help her purchase 3D printer filament, Duralar acetate sheets, bags, bands, glue and other supplies.
The fundraiser has now brought in over $15,000, allowing the team to buy two more 3D printers for a volunteer equipped for printing, along with gas money and hand sanitizer for those making the deliveries. Drozd said she doesn’t “touch the money at all” and has put a volunteer in charge of managing the funds.
“My commitment is to donate the 3D printers we bought with people’s money and donate to schools or hospitals so they can print themselves and make them,” Drozd said.
“I am hoping more people will make the shields. I am hoping whatever is happening on a larger scale with larger companies will come and rescue health workers because the response is slower than it should be,” the artist added.
“I am hoping at some point hospitals won’t have to risk the lives of their workers.”