Frank Lynch, Wilsons Creek
I’ve been reflecting on recent news reports about some people’s negative reactions to COVID-19 lockdowns and border closures.
I do feel that some people act as if everything is known about COVID by those in charge, i.e. the Chief Health Officers, epidemiology advisers and the state premiers, and that they are using this opportunity as a means of state control. Yet almost every day new data emerges about previously unknown aspects of COVID. There are still large gaps in our medical knowledge.
But that doesn’t stop some people, with minimal or no training in medical science, but empowered by a Facebook feed, from putting their own ‘authoritative’ views. Yet the same people would want to use hospitals if injured or ill… and for the hospitals not to be overwhelmed by COVID patients as they were in NY State.
Yes, recent measures like some border closures and aspects of lockdown need to be scrutinised and better honed as the danger of infection waxes and wanes. But recently some of the more inflammatory journalism or politicians’ comments have tended to feed dissent and encourage irresponsible street protests.
It is important to be able to your express one’s views about social issues such as Black Lives Matter, climate change (especially with the wildfires on the west coast of the US), even your constitutional right to protest itself. But there is a time and a place for street protest. At the moment it is not now in locked-down areas.
For four decades The Echo has printed the stories some people loved, some people hated, and some pretended not to read. If you want us to keep telling the truth, the real truth, not the sugar-coated version. We’ll need your support to keep the presses rolling. 
