Eating good food is important for overall health and wellness. That’s why local restaurant owner Mike Scott decided to start a Go Fund Me campaign called ‘Help Us Help Them.’

The campaign raises funds that allow food to be purchased from local restaurants and be sent to health care workers individually during the COVID-19 crisis.

“The whole idea is to support our health care workers if we can keep them healthy, then they can keep us healthy. That’s my idea,” said Scott. He made a donation on behalf of this own restaurant and then started the Go Fund Me on Saturday and since then they have had $800 be donated and completed two deliveries.

They’ve delivered food to the Strathmore Hospital’s health care workers last Friday and on Monday to the staff at the Peter Lougheed Centre in Calgary.

Similar to ordering a delivery service, but with quality food, organizers call and find out if health care workers would like food, and it is delivered in individual portions. Scott explained they are not able to make deliveries to large groups, only individuals.

“We took $250 worth of pan scramblers to the Peter Lougheed Centre and we got a picture back saying thank you very much,” said Scott.

Once the Go Fund Me campaign got started, Scott explained that a gentleman came into the store and gave them $500.

“People donate and I will track everything that comes through the door,” he said.

He will withdraw the money from the account and do an e-transfer to a well-rated restaurant near the hospital, to make sure they are paid for providing the food to the hospital.

He explained that the campaign is not just for Alberta. The campaign is meant to be across Canada. The way it works is Scott contacts a hospital and finds out how many people are working, and then the campaign calls local restaurants that are still open and asks if they would like to deliver say $300 worth of food to the hospital.

“It’s about helping them,” he said speaking of health care workers.

He explained that a member of his family is also a health care worker.

“Every single person knows somebody, is associated with somebody or has somebody that is in the healthcare industry and because of that we want to make sure that they are healthy,” he said.

“The best way to make sure they are healthy is to give them quality food. If they get run down, what’s going to happen? That virus is going to attack them and they are not going to be able to fight it off as efficiently as if they were healthy,” he said.

Exhaustion and malnutrition are big factors in staying healthy, says Scott.

“If they are not there when you get sick because they got sick, who is there to help you now?” he remarked.

For more information about the local campaign visit gofundme.com and lookup, ‘Help Us, Help Them’ in Strahmore.