Letters to the editor for June 10
Texas COVID rhetoric and reality
Your recent op-ed claiming that the governor of Texas deserves an apology for not requiring Texans to wear masks doesn’t include any data to back up its complacent satisfaction about how well Texas did by ignoring the advice of public health experts.
According to the Texas Department of Social and Health Services’ website, Texas has had 2,522,016 confirmed COVID-19 cases, and 50,590 deaths out of a population of 29,183,290. So in Texas, 8.6% of the population got sick.
According to the Washington DSHS website, we’ve had 404,473 confirmed cases, and 5,836 deaths. So in our state, where the governor paid attention to the advice of public health experts, and did what he could to make people wear masks, 5.3% of the population got sick.
If Texas had done as well as we’ve done, and only 5.3% of their population had ended up with COVID-19, 975,302 fewer people would have gotten sick; 19,563 fewer people would have died from it. We’re not through yet.
I think it’s fine for The Olympian to run conservative op-eds. I think it’s irresponsible to keep running conservative pieces like this and Jay Ambrose’s — full of snarky rhetoric and detached from the facts.
Thad Curtz, Olympia
Will demise of orcas be our legacy?
My husband and I visited the San Juan Islands for six summers in the 1980s. The Southern Resident orca pods were seen almost daily. Now, you’re lucky if you see them at all.
Orcas are intelligent creatures. The fish-eating resident orcas are family-oriented; they travel together, fish together, and sleep together. They are tactile and vocal beings, calling to one another and rubbing up against each other as they glide through the water together. And they have feelings, as evidenced by Tahlequah, the grieving mother orca who carried her dead calf around for 17 days.
Today, the Southern Resident orcas spend most of their time searching for the few remaining Chinook salmon. Their young have a high mortality rate. Orcas are washing up on beaches from ship strikes, and the salmon are on the brink of extinction. Yet the public outcry for real action to save the whales and the salmon seems to fall on deaf ears — the political will to act boldly and decisively is virtually nonexistent. As a result, the Southern Resident orcas will likely die off over the next 30 years.
Will this be our legacy — that at a crucial time, when we could have acted to increase the chances of the whales’ and salmon’s survival, we chose instead to ring their death knell? I think about that last, lonely Southern Resident orca out there, searching for its pod mates — calling out, with no reply.
Christina Price, Rochester
COVID carnival
State Rep. Jim Walsh’s reported comments about the ”carnival” atmosphere being pitched by state officials to entice COVID vaccinations are entirely correct.
The way this state has handled the pandemic has been manipulative from the beginning. Washington joined the “Western States Compact” in fighting the pandemic with California, Oregon, Nevada, and Colorado for pure political posturing. Fear-mongering case numbers were reported hourly in media outlets. “Following the science” became the mantra amid conflicting medical reporting. Ever-changing social directives were imposed, and the state’s economy was shut down. Many children lost a year of education. Multiple changes to COVID data collection were necessitated to correct state reporting. ...
Thousands of residents — many at-risk elderly — navigated a confusing state-run, “appointment only” process with long lines in winter weather. No incentives offered — personal responsibility required.
Now there are vaccine lottery prizes, and injections are available at pot shops with recipients enjoying freebie joints. Washington’s COVID carnival is here indeed!
Jann Coffman, Olympia