Has Hilton Head got New York paranoia during COVID-19 caronavirus pandemic? | Letters
I read with interest the recent letter saying the writer say “no less than 11 cars from New York and 12 cars from New Jersey” which “were all larger SUV’s holding at least five people each.” Really?
This sounds like a caravan of invaders from the Northeast: 23 cars in a half mile that are all with one of two state plates and all large SUV’s and all holding at least five people.
This is either nonsense or the most staggering coincidence of all time. Talk about paranoia.
Paul Armstrong
Hilton Head Island
Let Amazon help government
An idea worth considering:
I have been following the news about the COVID-19 pandemic. The networks keep talking about the shortages of pesonal protection equipment and other items to fight this virus. It appears that the government doesn’t have a handle on the problem. I have an idea on how to solve the problem:
Amazon is one of the world’s best distributers of products. Almost everyone uses its services – go to its web site, select the product you want, put it in your shopping cart, check out with your payment and address and the product is on your doorstep, sometimes within 24 to 48 hours. Amazon is an expert in this type of operation and it has the software, warehousing, personnel, tracking system, record-keeping, delivery vehicles, and aircraft to do the job. The government should hire this company immediately. We need its service now to save lives and stop the virus.
We did this with testing by using proven laboratories, LabCorp and Quest. We don’t have time to develop a system. Use proven systems and experts to run them. It could be up and running immediately.
Robert Ovelman
Hilton Head Island
Ask if you are doing all you can
With an undergraduate degree in public health and as the (almost!) holder of a master’s of social work, I feel as though I have an adequate view of the principles of human behavior and why people act the way they do.
We, as a society, however, have implemented terms of morality on individuals who don’t act in accordance with our health values. This morality is unfair and doesn’t take into consideration the full picture of people’s situations.
This can be argued with COVID-19.
Instead of viewing individuals’ resistance to social distancing as a moral failure — they don’t care, they’re insensitive, they think they’re invincible — why can’t we look at our mechanisms of information projection and our public health messaging and ask: are we doing everything we can possibly do?
How can our news outlets provide information that isn’t swimming in fear-based rhetoric in order to support tangible, substantiated suggestions and recommendations for our citizens?
Why must we resort to shaming individuals who make choices with which we, the alleged arbiters of safety and health, disagree?
This negativity will certainly have impacts on these individuals and society at-large, but this lack of knowledge isn’t these individuals’ faults.
I’m an academic. This is my fault. I am not actively attempting to review and edit information and provide it through networks that reach those who aren’t getting the message. Are you at fault, too?
Elouise Cram
Bluffton
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