CORONAVIRUS: STRONGER TOGETHER
Santa Gets Head Start With Christmas Eve Delivery To SLC Hospitals
Dec 24, 2020, 10:01 PM | Updated: 11:20 pm
SALT LAKE CITY, Utah – After the year we’ve had, even Santa needed a little Christmas Eve head start.
That’s why he visited LDS Hospital in Salt Lake City Thursday night instead of Friday morning.
He wanted to make sure health care workers got an early gift.
Santa also visited Primary Children’s Hospital and the University of Utah Hospital on Thursday.
DoorDash and Uber Eats have nothing on Santa. He got a head start on Christmas by delivering food to health care workers in hospitals. He knows not everyone gets Christmas Eve off and he wanted to say thank you. @KSL5TV at 10. #ksltv #MerryChristmasEve pic.twitter.com/wXVSDZGCmS
— Alex Cabrero (@KSL_AlexCabrero) December 25, 2020
He was delivering pizzas and snack boxes to health care workers who don’t get to take the day off.
Emergencies don’t pay attention to calendars.
“This was the best way I could figure out how to deliver a little bit of joy to people who have to work,” he said.
It’s a Christmas Eve tradition David Lamb has been doing for years.
Lamb dresses up as Santa and delivers food to health care workers.
“You get to spread goodwill and cheer,” he said. “And I love Christmas.
Lamb said he remembers how hard his mother-in-law worked for two decades at Dixie Regional Medical Center in southern Utah.
“We would go spend Christmas in St. George and wait for her to come open presents and she’d come home exhausted because it was work,” said Lamb. “So, my wife and I decided this is what we were going to do. We wanted to bring them some joy and thank them for working.”
Normally, Lamb bakes and brings those baked goods to hospitals.
However, this year, thanks to that big lump of coal known as COVID-19, he brought them pizzas and snack boxes instead.
He knows nurses and doctors have had a tough year.
“Our health care workers have been under a lot of stress and if we can add just a little bit of something to their lives this evening, a little bit of appreciation for what they do, that makes it good for me,” he said.
Besides, you never know when a trip down a chimney might require a visit to the hospital.
Maybe Santa is buttering them up just in case. But even if he doesn’t visit for an emergency, he knows medical workers are taking care of other patients.
And they won’t be hungry doing it.
“They really appreciate it,” said Lamb. “They appreciate that people remember them.”
