Letter: We need to work together to fight COVID-19

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To the Editor:

Freedom. We all want it. I am tired of all of the restrictions, closures, regulations and mandates related to COVID-19. We need to work together to get past these infringements on our freedom.

The idea of each person being responsible for their own health is basically valid, but, as with all facts, there are some qualifications. Here’s the rub: COVID-19 is highly contagious. The virus wants to spread and continue to restrict our freedom. It takes all of us to fight back and defeat the virus. Even if you are willing to risk catching COVID-19 yourself, unfortunately, it also impacts other people. For that simple and obvious reason, you do not have the freedom to do what you want with the virus.

Getting fully vaccinated will protect you against COVID-19. No vaccination is 100% perfect; remember how the clinical trials showed about 90% effectiveness. If you contract COVID-19, because it is so highly communicable, you are putting other persons’ health and lives at risk. So with the usual caveat that there are a very small number of people who cannot be vaccinated, it is imperative you get the shots to save other people.

Wearing a face mask will protect you against COVID-19. Again, not 100%, but anything we do to fight back against the freedom-killing virus is important. And again, wearing the face mask helps to protect other people. With the steep rise in pediatric COVID-19 cases, anyone who wants schools to unmask students – or teachers – is pro-virus.

Therefore, saying that parents should have the choice whether their kids’ wear masks in school is irresponsible. When the vaccine soon becomes available to children, make sure they get vaccinated along with you. Vaccinations aren’t political.

Sadly, we’ve all seen news that is only too real, showing former vaccine skeptics dying of COVID-19, admitting their past error and imploring others to get vaccinated. Don’t let that be you.

We don’t have a constitutional or moral right to infect other people with this virus. Anyone who resists this basic truth is pro-virus, anti-freedom, pro-death, anti-life.

Stan Perrin

Crystal Lake