I REFER to John White’s excellent letter in the February Herald about the importance of placing community above self in order to sustain a society long-term.
As a lifelong ‘people watcher’ I have been watching our community since the start of the COVID-19 pandemic and some of what I have seen I find very alarming.
I have particular concerns about the negativity of some people towards public health safety requirements for vaccinations and masks.
This seems to me to focus entirely on ‘self’ and ignores the fact that these measures help play a significant part in protecting others, particularly the most vulnerable in our society.
Read more
Viral loads linger in the air and can be insidious.
People who have COVID-19 and don’t know it – as is often the case initially – are often infectious before they show symptoms.
If you wear a mask and are breathing out large amounts of virus, most of it – though, of course, not all – gets trapped in your mask.
Infected people who don’t wear masks are continually breathing out lots of COVID-19 into the air around them.
The more COVID-19 you breathe into the air, the greater the risk that others around you will be infected.
However, the risk of infection reduces for others with masks, and the risk is reduced several fold if both people are masked.
This focus on ‘self’ above community would make sense if those who were behaving that way were all at severe risk of personal harm from public health measures.
This may be the case for a very small number but for most of us, wearing a mask is a discomfort and an irritation and no more.
I have Chronic Obstructive Pulmonary Disease (COPD), am claustrophobic and find wearing a mask very unpleasant – it makes me cough, I find it difficult to breathe properly and I feel ‘smothered’.
But I prefer to be able to sleep at night with a clear conscience that I have done my best to minimise the risk to others if I should unbeknownst have COVID-19.
A few further thoughts to consider.
About 30 per cent of people have one or more chronic conditions of which they may or may not be aware, that increases their risk of serious illness or death from COVID-19.
About 10 to 30 per cent of people who get COVID-19 will suffer long-term health problems regardless of whether their infection was mild or severe.
The least vaccinated in our community are the very young – they have no say, so it is surely up to us to try and keep them as safe as possible from long-term health problems.
It is all very well to say ‘the vulnerable should stay at home’ but what about those who are not vulnerable themselves but have family members at home who may be?
Name and address withheld by request.
