Letters to the editor | Sunday, April 12, 2020: Young people, wash your hands and keep your distance

Millennials: It’s not all about you

Thank you to all millennials for thinking of me and trying to stay healthy so that when we might both be in the ICU, my life-saving treatment won’t be awarded to you instead of me based on age. You see, I am doing everything I can to avoid this plague but at times I see you being less than cautious. Your disregard for social distancing, lack of face coverings, and no gloves is alarming.

I wear my mask, respect your 6-foot space, wash my hands frequently, and more to limit my exposure, just to keep both you and me healthy. I would appreciate you doing the same.

Think of me as your sweet grandmother, or perhaps your elderly co-worker, or even the ICU nurse keeping you alive and please do your part to allow us older folk to not have to compete with you when the doctor has to decide who to ventilate. Let’s all do our part to help one another stay healthy.

Nancy Kramer, Modesto

Staying sane in coronavirus crisis

Even loving spouses, companions or friends can be out of sorts, tense and short-tempered when cooped up because of the coronavirus. Here are some steps I find helpful in reducing my short temper: Get some sun and breathe fresh air each day. Plant some flowers and summer vegetables and watch them grow from week to week. Dig in the garden. Connect with friends and family by phone or the internet. Take a walk. Play favorite music. Apologize for being short-tempered.

Look at all that is beautiful around you, including your loved ones.

Leroy Egenberger, Modesto

We surely don’t need this invasion

I’m a person of concern regarding lack of personal protective equipment and caring for victims of the coronavirus. I understand the shortage, but will someone explain why COVID-positive patients are being transferred from the Bay Area to our local hospitals? There is not enough to go around as it is, so why bring COVID patients from other counties here?

And what will happen to local people when they need hospital care? Where are they supposed to get medical care, with our hospitals full of COVID-positive patients from the bay? Not to mention increasing the spread of the virus.

Stay-home orders should mean “Stay home.”

Margaret Hegwood, Ceres

Editor’s note: Although local hospital employees have told The Bee it’s possible they could receive patients from the Bay Area, our hospitals have not confirmed it.

What’s the harm in a little golf?

I know that we are in a health crisis that is requiring that we maintain social distance from each other. I have been in various stores that have not closed and I witness many people inevitably clustered upon occasion. I have no problem with this. We do the best we can.

Up until two weeks ago my wife and I played a couple of rounds of golf every week. We never got within six feet of anybody and enjoyed the fresh air and exercise. Now someone has determined that all the golf courses be closed, as if you couldn’t maintain social distance on a golf course.

In this time when restaurants, movie theaters, libraries, and other means of trying to not go stir crazy are closed, this just doesn’t make any sense. Could someone revisit this decision?

Michael Powell, Modesto

St. Stanislaus sets good example

I would like to commend St. Stanislaus Catholic School in Modesto on the impeccable job that its teachers, principal, and staff have accomplished in meeting and surpassing the needs of their students when they instituted their online learning program. In anticipation of the current COVID-19 situation, they had begun preparing in advance. This well-thought-out preparation enabled online learning to begin almost immediately once the school closed on March 16. Your hard work and tireless dedication are greatly admired and appreciated.

Maria Oliveira-O’Brien, Modesto

My big day turned out different, too

Graduation is different this year, as it was for me. I went to my graduation in 1993 in a wheelchair.

The virus, COVID-19, surprised the world this year and graduation was postponed.

A drunken driver hit me in April of 1992, damaging my hearing capabilities, walking and speech. I also could not attend proms and senior events. Now, I write letters in California newspapers and give speeches with law enforcement making people aware of the dangers of driving drunk.

It is disappointing that you will not have the typical graduation, but you are history in the making. Imagine this: 28 years from now, you will be able to tell kids and others about this experience. You can explain about social distancing, wearing masks, how it affected you, and how cleansing everything was emphasized. Our situations differ, but we missed many pleasures of the senior year.

I always have high hopes for the future, as students should have. You will get your diploma and remember these days. The mayhem the world is facing now will be interesting to talk about. I wish you the best, graduates!

Lori Martin, Tracy

Get it together, Congress

While the effort of California men, women, and private organizations going that extra mile during this coronavirus assault is more than outstanding, and is an addition to the bravery and sacrifice of our first responders, we don’t have the same type of focused commitment from most of our representatives in Washington, D.C. During this last effort to bring some medical and economic coronavirus relief we had these folks concerned with funding the National Endowment of the Arts, public broadcasting, the Kennedy Center for the Performing Arts and other things of a similar nature. Their wrangling over these unrelated issues substantially delayed help coming to us.

It seems to me that the mindset to create such delays is counter to the attitude currently displayed by the citizens of California. Perhaps we have sent too many people unlike ourselves to D.C.

Charles Shetron, Oakdale

Rewriting COVID-19 history

There are many galling, hyperbolic, and misconstrued comments made by Donald Trump during the COVID-19 briefings. I feel my blood pressure rise when he coats over thousands of deaths with the comment, “No one saw this coming.” Really? Obama’s transition team in 2017 told Trump the same information that the results of the CDC’s “Innovation for Pandemic Countermeasures,” held in Atlanta in 2018, mirrored completely. The only thing scarier about the fact that a pandemic was certain were the massive gaps in the USA’s defense.

Most of our protection was lost when Trump dissolved the Global Health and Early Pandemic Response section of the National Security Council, established in 2014 after the Ebola scare. For over three years, Trump has ignored dire warnings, equally frightening briefings, and direct conversations with experts regarding a pending pandemic. Just like Fox News, he made light of their concerns when it was discovered in America.

Now, as he often does, he wishes to rewrite history to place himself in a better light. Remember that when he says, “Who could have ever imagined something like this?” Look how easily he can lie with blood on his hands.

Dean Jepson, Turlock

The king of self-promotion

During this coronavirus pandemic we have all searched for guidance, truth and leadership. Unfortunately, when we hear the president speak we get none of the above. It makes me think of the Huey Lewis song “I Want a New Drug.” He is using daily briefings as a political echo chamber to promote himself. He drones on and on. It hurts my head to listen to all of his lies and falsehoods. It is making me nervous and sickens me to watch his antics.

I want the truth, I want guidance and I do want leadership. For that you have to watch Gov. Cuomo from New York or Gov. Newsom from California. With Cuomo and Newsom, I have faith, hope and an eagerness to beat this pandemic.

Hopefully, the president’s cult of personality will end in November. Hopefully then we will have the pandemic and the Cheeto man in our rear mirror. If not, America will enter a real dark era. Then all of us will need a new drug.

Dennis Thomas, Modesto

Governors know how to lead

President Trump, you’re no better than a snake oil salesmen. Thank God we have competent, intelligent governors like Newsom (CA) and Cuomo (NY) who have been there to help us and keep us alive. You are going to kill us all with your inaction, fake claims and misinformation. Shame on you. You don’t care about us.

Am I mad? Damn straight I am! You’re supposed to be our leader; instead, you’re leading us to slaughter.

Jane M. Mazurczak, Salida