Since the beginning of March, the Unemployed Help Centre has witnessed an 86 per cent increase in the number of people who need food over the same period last year.
On Thursday, Hotel-Dieu Grace Healthcare will host a food drive for the centre in a bid to meet the growing demand for food donations across the region. Between 6:30 a.m. and 5 p.m., the centre will have its vehicles parked in front of the Toldo Neurobehavioural Institute at Hotel-Dieu Grace Healthcare's campus on Prince Road.
The jump in demand is at the UHC's Unifor Local 200 People's Choice Pantry alone. Since March 16, there have been 18,020 visits. The Unemployed Help Centre said Monday it had helped 3,497 households.
The centre on Cantelon Drive is closed for in-person appointments and drop-ins, but the food bank is open for drive-thru/walk-up Mondays, Wednesdays, and Fridays from 11 a.m. to 2 p.m.
The Windsor Essex Food Bank Association, which represents 15 food banks across the region, has served 5,435 families. There have been 25,810 visits to those facilities since March 16.
Since the start of the COVID-19 pandemic, UHC has opened drive-up food box locations to meet demand, including in Leamington and Lakeshore, and two in Windsor.
Recently, it hosted one-day locations in Essex and Harrow, and the communications manager, Laura Lemmon-Sellon, said the centre is studying the need to host more events there.