Red Cross blood drives plummeted because of COVID-19. A Montco teen and his mom came to the rescue.

In the earliest days of the pandemic, when virtually everything was shut, Dawn Zucca got a call from a concerned Red Cross manager: Businesses, schools — just about every place scheduled to host blood drives — had canceled. It was a worrisome trend across the country.

The Harleysville woman and her teenage son, Peter, had been helping the local Red Cross host blood drives since 2015 as a way of giving back. As a young child battling cancer, Peter received 51 units of blood before he turned 2.

Could the Zuccas host another drive for the Southeastern Pennsylvania Region Red Cross’ Delaware Valley chapter? the manager asked.

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“Peter and I thought, ‘Wow, this is nuts,’” Zucca, 56, recalled. “What if nobody was donating blood and there was a train derailment or SEPTA accident or a shooting?” Or a young cancer patient who couldn’t get treatment.

The Zuccas got permission from their church, Towamencin Mennonite, to use its large facility off the Lansdale exit of the Pennsylvania Turnpike. And they didn’t stop at one drive.

They hosted 12 drives in 14 days from March 23 to April 4, giving donors whose drives were canceled a place to go and attracting others from their own donor list.

That was just the beginning. In all of 2020, they were responsible for 44 drives — almost one a week — and helped the Red Cross collect nearly 4,000 units of blood, enough to benefit 12,000 people. It was one of the largest single efforts in the Red Cross region and accounted for 11% of blood collected during drives in Montgomery County last year, said Jennifer Graham, executive director of the Delaware Valley chapter.

“I never really met a pair like this who are so committed in every way and stuck with it,” said Rosanne Marks, a Red Cross account manager for nearly four decades and the one who made the call to the Zuccas that day. “They just came to our rescue.”

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Peter said he didn’t envision the effort expanding as it did. But when he saw how successful the drives were, he wanted to keep going.

“Everyone has a need, and the need never ends,” Peter, 18, said last week at the church, with another drive underway in its fellowship hall. “At one point in my life, it was me, and now it’s me giving back to make sure that it’s nobody.”

When he was just 10 months old, Peter was diagnosed with rhabdomyosarcoma, a cancer that attacks the muscular system. The cancer was in his pelvis and had spread to his lungs. It meant years of treatment — with effects still lingering — and more than a dozen trips to the operating room. He ultimately lost most of his right leg, suffered hearing loss and nerve damage, and had his spine fused.

The Zuccas six years ago started a nonprofit, the Peter Powerhouse Foundation, which provides support to families of young cancer patients, including meals, gas cards, gifts — anything they need. The foundation bought a car for one family and covered funeral expenses for another, Zucca said. It also has donated to local hospitals several hundred wagons, which young cancer patients prefer to wheelchairs, and four expensive cinema vision goggles that allow children to watch movies during MRIs, she said.

In 2015 when he was 12, Peter and his family hosted their first blood drive after seeing a friend post on Facebook that she couldn’t get chemotherapy because her blood counts were low and the hospital didn’t have enough blood. More than 100 units were donated that day; the family has held a handful of drives every year since then. In total, their drives have garnered 6,400 units.

Peter began donating blood when he turned 16 and could. Given his risk factors, he stopped when COVID-19 hit. He also stopped attending most drives. But he intends to resume both in April after he is fully vaccinated. For now, he sends emails to set up the drives, calls and schedules donors, and runs the sign-up for volunteers. Dawn Zucca volunteers at the drives, and the Zuccas promote them on the foundation’s Facebook page.

”It’s incredible that somebody that young can make such a difference,” said Katie Duffy, 48, of Harleysville, one of 267 donors who gave nearly 250 units of blood at the Zuccas’ two drives last week.

Early on, when federal health officials thought the virus spread readily through surfaces, Zucca and her husband, Dennis, would thoroughly clean the church after each drive. They still clean but focus on high-touch surfaces, such as doorknobs.

Matt Raley, lead pastor of the Mennonite church, said he was struck by the Zuccas’ commitment and “their ability to take really devastating setbacks and determine that we’re going to see good come out of this.”

Peter also is the youngest member on the local Red Cross chapter’s eight-member board. He has won multiple leadership awards and scholarships through Red Cross and was featured in its national youth council magazine. He tries to get peers to donate, but sometimes finds it a hard sell.

“Usually the key is telling them they can get free Chick-fil-A,” he said.

Peter soon will get a new prosthetic leg and recently started driving with a specially equipped left foot gas pedal. He is finishing high school classes online and is dual enrolled at Montgomery County Community College.

He plans to stay involved with the Red Cross when he leaves in the fall for Lipscomb University, a Christian college in Nashville, where he plans to major in business administration. He visited the university three years ago and spoke at a Christian youth rally, an invitation that came about after The Inquirer profiled him in 2015.

That invite started when Heather Tucker, a third-grade teacher in Tennessee, read about Peter, and her class raised about $800 to help with the purchase of wagons. In appreciation, the Zuccas sent Peter Powerhouse T-shirts to the entire class. Tucker’s husband works with the youth rally at Lipscomb and suggested Peter as a speaker.

Every year now during the holidays, the Zuccas provide milk and cookies to the school, which serves a large concentration of low-income students.

“They are just the most amazing family I ever met,” Tucker said.

Her students agree. Some wrote letters to Peter.

“You inspired me not only to help myself but to help others,” one third grader wrote. “… You have really changed the inside of me so that makes me happy.”