When the news of a novel corona-type virus outbreak first came out, it was mostly far away places; New York, Italy and China. It seemed like a problem for other people, elsewhere. But then friends of friends started getting sick. Then people I knew started catching it. Most of them recovered after a few weeks. Most, but not all. A couple of them didn’t recover right away. My college friend’s sister died of Covid-19 complications and her brother had to adopt her children. Another friend is currently fund raising for her father’s lung transplant because his have been ravaged by the disease. My husband lost a cousin. There are names to go with the numbers. The US is number one in deaths and fourth in Covid orphans worldwide.

The glut of Covid patients has made it harder for others too. Currently, my brother has had a routine surgery that’s been postponed indefinitely because all the hospitals in Oregon are bursting with Covid patients. Another friend had her cancer surgery canceled twice because it wasn’t urgent enough to stay in the queue. Cancer was not a priority when people are dying every day.

I get that being socially distanced and quarantined and masked is stifling. I didn’t enjoy suddenly homeschooling last year. We have all had to make sacrifices and alterations, but let’s not have all of our struggles be in vain. There is one fully FDA-approved vaccine and two emergency vaccines available to anyone 12 and older who wants one, for free. Please get the shot and help slow the pandemic. If you won’t do that, at least wear a mask in public. We have the tools to help ourselves, now we just need to use them.