Former fashion stylist Alethea Gold says our doctors are terrified by COVID-19 due to a lack of equipment and she is determined to help
Alethea Gold used to raise funds and much-needed health equipment for third-world countries, but now, she’s needed here.
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Compassion and humility sit easily on Alethea Gold’s shoulders. The kindness in her eyes shines naturally beneath her tumbling trademark red locks, matching her easygoing personality. Her gentle demeanour, though, is belied by something else: she describes herself as “feisty and tenacious”.
As the global goodwill ambassador for SmartAID, an Israeli-based NGO specialising in using technology for humanitarian work in disaster zones, soon to open an office in Sydney, her tenacity has been crucial as she, and her humanitarian team, have delivered assistance globally in times of trouble.
She’s been on the frontline of it all; tsunamis, war zones, hurricanes, earthquakes, drought, people fleeing oppressive regimes such as the Taliban and ISIS and, most recently, helping in the aftermath of the devastating bushfires on Kangaroo Island.
She was in The Bahamas when Hurricane Dorian flattened most of the island of Abaco, in Sulawesi following the tsunami last year, in Mozambique and Puerto Rico and she has, astonishingly, managed to have supplies delivered to Yazidis sheltering from the horrors of ISIS on Sinjar Mountain in Iraq.
But now she has turned to a frontline closer to home – fighting for our medics who are facing the worst health crisis the country has ever seen while, at the same time, facing shortages of personal protective equipment to keep them safe.
“The doctors on the frontline are not prepared, they are terrified,” she says, her voice breaking with emotion.
“They don’t have the right personal protective equipment. I’ve had some in tears on the phone, absolutely terrified that they are having to go to work, without the proper equipment.”
She has been up until the small hours every day trying to source masks, goggles and hazmat suits for them, tapping every contact she has, to find them.
It’s a long way from her more glamorous roots.
Alethea spent 35 years in the fashion industry, travelling the world as an award-winning, much-in-demand stylist, specialising in children’s fashion, the brains behind the iconic magazine Studio Bambini.
While she left that world some years ago, she has always been involved with supporting charities. A decade ago she published three tomes to raise money for orphans of AIDS victims, books endorsed by actor Jackie Chan and musicians Sir Bob Geldof and Sting.
But four years ago she fell into working with SmartAID, alongside founder Shachar Zahavi, who she says inspires her daily.
She has maintained contacts from her former life and doesn’t hesitate to call on them to assist her in her humanitarian works. For example, when she needed help for an event she organised with actor Rachel Ward to raise funds for Australian children in need, she managed to persuade Sting to sing at the event. Ward has been a stalwart in Alethea’s charity work over many years.
“I’ve made a lot of beautiful connections through the years,” she says.
“You’d be surprised at the number of generous and compassionate people and businesses out there who simply want to help.”
Softly spoken and gentle, the rod of steel that makes her so efficient at sourcing supplies, managing to get them delivered when societies have broken down, and flying out to trouble spots at a day’s notice to face death, destruction and the most harrowing of human despair, should not be underestimated.
“I just go where I have to go,” she says from the serenity of her Rose Bay garden. “I don’t have time for Post Traumatic Stress. I don’t have time to reflect on where I’ve been, or the horrors that I’ve seen.
“It’s usually straight on to the next catastrophe.”
When Abaco in The Bahamas was laid waste by Hurricane Dorian, Alethea and her team flew in, delivering thousands of water purifying kits, hygiene packs and Dengue Fever protection as well as 5000 solar powered ‘Little Sun’ lights, which can be worn around the neck. Not only did they light the way, but in circumstances where more than 1000 people were crammed into the only remaining building, a gym, pitch black at night with no electricity, and in which the febrile atmosphere meant women and children were at risk of rape and other abuse, not only did they light the way, they protected their carriers.
Human nature, in all its cruelty, means potential perpetrators are less likely to strike if they know they will be seen by others in their evil.
Currently, Alethea is trying to find someone with a private plane to fly thousands of masks and goggles into Australia when she finds them because, she has no doubt, find them she will. When we speak, she is trying to raise millions of dollars in 24 hours for the equipment she is sourcing for our doctors, even though some would say they should be sought and paid for by the government.
“Finally, the Health Department has said they will help and I’m sending them all my contacts for everything that I have sourced and what’s available to order right now,” she says.
“I don’t have millions of dollars to pay for this equipment, otherwise I would have ordered it myself.”
As she works to help, she feels we are, collectively, being too complacent – thoughts echoed by a senior hospital doctor, who is working to help Alethea in her mission, but who would not be named for fear of being sacked.
He says: “We do not have the right PPE or enough of what we do have. Doctors and nurses are on the front line, in the trenches, if you like, but without the right armour and fighting bullets we cannot see.
“Medical staff are repeatedly exposed to higher viral loads. Hospitals are the worst place to be. The government needs to face up to this and the situation we are in.”
Alethea adds: “We’ve seen what’s happening in Italy, in New York. New York is in a first-world country and we too are a first-world country. We’ve been far too complacent.”
Last week, the Chinese-owned companies which have been shipping vital equipment – including masks and hand sanitiser – to China from Australia were revealed. Subsequently, Home Affairs Minister Peter Dutton stepped in to stop the practice.
“In Italy they have already lost 64 doctors. We don’t want that to happen here. We have to protect our doctors on the frontline,” says Alethea.
As the pandemic engulfs the globe Alethea takes comfort in her husband, Eli, children, Larnce and Taryn and her four grandsons.
“My family life is beautiful,” she says. “They know I have to go away at a moment’s notice. All of them have been instilled with the same sense of compassion and caring.
“Eli, is a dentist and he has supported my crazy life from day one.”
For a woman from the sometimes fickle world of fashion, her transformation to a charity tour de force, could seem surprising.
She credits her upbringing for her compassion.
“My late dad, Bernie Lazarus, was very compassionate, always giving, giving, giving,” she says, reflectively. “I guess I just learned it from him.”
“I had a very tortured childhood,” she says. “My parents got divorced when I was five years old, it was very much a War of the Roses. I was lucky. When I was 14, I went to live with my Dad, and because I had his unconditional love, I survived. I miss him terribly.”
She throws her head back in laughter, as she recalls her fashion days. “I was once arrested in Mexico for kidnapping a busload of schoolchildren while doing a fashion shoot for Studio Bambini. I’d cleared it with the school principal but he forgot to tell one of the mothers. She turned up to school to collect her daughter who wasn’t there and instantly phoned the police. It took many hours of explaining with much lost in translation.”
“I loved the time and I still have my contacts and friends from that period,” she says. “I miss being creative, but I don’t miss fashion.”
Many people would say she’s beyond creative, an angel from the eastern suburbs, a life saver. Her other favourite nickname, as she’s known to many, is Fairy. And she is, bringing a particular kind of magic to people in need.
NB: Moments before this story appeared in The Wentworth Courier print edition, Alethea learned that the Victor Smorgon Group was to donate 20,000 masks, suits and hoods to Sydney doctors fighting COVID-19. The equipment arrived April 8.