Free Groceries & COVID Vaccinations at AUHS

Saturday, June 19, 2021, was a day filled with God’s blessings and grace. Although it was a very busy and productive day with three concurrent events, those who are underserved and in need were able to receive opportunities to help themselves and their families.

One of the concurrent events was AUHS Foundation’s Acts of Love event. Held as a quarterly event, Acts of Love provides free groceries and food supplies for the underserved population. Attendees began lining up before 7:00 AM and many of them were senior citizens. AUHS staff and student volunteers handed out fresh groceries to 400 families in less than one hour. Each box of food included a whole chicken and ten lbs. of leg quarters, ten lbs. of potatoes, five lbs. of carrots, a bag of rice, and canned vegetables. Our youngest volunteer, Matthew (age 9) helped hand out canned corn. Since there was a great need for groceries, supplies ran out which was a first in the history of the Acts of Love events. In result, Pastor Gregory Johnson, AUHS Co-Founder, distributed $20 to each person who was not able to receive groceries. We want to thank our local partner, Superior Grocers corporation, for providing 10% discount on the groceries and store #119 for delivering the groceries to AUHS Foundation.

Along with our Acts of Love event was the COVID vaccination clinic. 50 people were vaccinated with the option of Moderna and Johnson & Johnson vaccines. AUHS’ Master of Science in Nursing students, preceptor Ms. Maria Shearing, School of Pharmacy students, and preceptor Dr. Sara Kim vaccinated clients. In addition to getting $20 cash from Pastor Johnson to cover any transportation costs, vaccine recipients entered a raffle to win prizes,. Congratulations to Mr. Wilfredo for winning 2 Disneyland tickets and to Mr. Doroteo for winning 4 Knott’s Berry Farm tickets & parking voucher! We would like to extend our appreciation and thanks to Dr. Thi Dang and the San Gabriel Medical Pharmacy for supplying the vaccines.

Lastly, the university library staff held an on-site PubMed training for community members. The university was awarded the National Library of Medicine (NLM) Grant for 18k back in September 2020, which will mainly go towards equipment for academic programs, student use, and participant compensation. At these community outreach events, AUHS students demonstrated to participants on how to find reliable health information using the Internet and the NLM database.