Sep 19, 2020 2 min read

Beyond finality, death has many variations, being unable to breathe a more tortuous one. If a mental image of personally dying is unnerving, consider a loved one, even a child terminally ill. What is need to understand gasping for air as the respiratory system fails? Harried health care workers orchestrate desperate therapies to forestall finality. If the patient feels no pain, the helpless, watchful families and caregivers do. 

Recoveries are sometimes marginal, now permanent heart damage possible, a future unpredictable. Horrifying secondary complications affect some children. Childhood immunity is a myth, and school openings an experiment. 

All this because an exposure became an illness. This because a person with spacey thinking equated a piece of fabric with freedom of speech. How does a mask curtail the ability to speak? Freedom to talk is not impaired. Is an entry notice sign stating, “No shirt, no shoes, no service,” a denial of freedom also?

If we accept that we are our brother’s keeper, however distant, we must care about the well-being of others. Obviously, no one should make life or death decisions for someone else. Freedom extends to risk-takers as long as their behavior does not endanger others. There are many ways to challenge fate (illness and accidents). A single decision about socializing and masks cannot be allowed to decide the destiny of another individual.

History will not be kind nor should it forgive that which could have been otherwise. Most other civilized nations function with mask-wearing even mandated. For now, a 6-by-8-inch piece of cloth can save lives. 

Defy the oncoming train if you like; you’re free to stand on the tracks maskless, but stand alone.

Dorothy Acciai

Washington