I had to shave my beard again today, so that I can comfortably wear a mask again in public.

The ignorance of anti-maskers and anti-vaxxers has held this country hostage, prolonged the pandemic and caused the needless death of countless Americans all because of their belief in conspiracies and irrational fears.

To those who willingly refuse to be vaccinated and wear a mask, How many of your own family and friends have to suffer and die before you wake up?

With freedom come an enormous amount of personal responsibility. Our personal exercise of liberty can not infringe upon or deny that same liberty to another individual. Refusing to be vaccinated and wear a mask puts the health and wellbeing of other Americans at risk. Your inaction denies the basic God-given right to life to countless others.

So, once again, I will do my part, despite the refusal of others. I’ve been fully vaccinated and I will wear a mask to protect those like my nephew, who is not old enough to be vaccinated, for those like my son, who is immune compromised, and for all those minors, who, by no fault of their own, are victims of ignorant parents who refuse to have them vaccinated.

I worry that we have yet to see the worst COVID-19 has to offer. I understand that the Lambda variant is now being tracked in America, Florida in particular. This variant, like the dominate Delta variant, is highly transmissible. However, the fact that it may be vaccine resistant should frighten us all.

We could stop the mutation of this virus by simply getting vaccinated, thus denying the virus a host. Come on America! If we’re truly in this together then do your part.

“In our obsession with antagonisms of the moment, we often forget how much unites all the members of humanity.
Perhaps we need some outside, universal threat to make us recognize this common bond. I occasionally think how quickly our differences worldwide would vanish if we were facing an alien threat from outside this world”
— Ronald Reagan Sept. 21, 1987

What a disappointment we must be to President Reagan, for isn’t this virus an alien threat of a sort? The lack of a unified global response to this pandemic is sad. Instead, we have seen nations and states rushing to defend and support their own socio-economic interests and individuals who’ve lost all compassion for others, refusing to sacrifice for the sake of the greater good.

What does this say about this generation? Would we have won two world wars with the mentality of Americans today?

Would we, as Reagan hoped, unite to fight off an alien threat? It certainly doesn’t look promising.

America, I dare you to prove me wrong. Please get vaccinated and wear a mask in public. After this year and a half of hell, it’s only together that we can hope to put this behind us and open our nation and it’s economy again.

Richard Duvendeck II
Chesapeake