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Editorial: Make it safer for children


Last week, Uvalde Memorial Hospital treated a 7-year-old child enduring complications from COVID-19, and still others have been sickened by the virus that is continuing to kill thousands of people. Also last week, Uvalde County added three more deaths to its virus death toll, which now rings in at 76, yet only 47.45 percent of county residents 12 and older are fully vaccinated. An additional 10 percent have received one dose of the vaccine.

Comparatively, 74.87 parent of county residents 65 and older are fully vaccinated, while another 8 percent have received one dose.

Since March, 88 of the people hospitalized at Uvalde Memorial Hospital due to COVID-19 complications were not vaccinated, and they ranged in age from 7 to 88. Only eight vaccinated people were hospitalized, and they ranged in age from 65 to 86.

In the last month, the county has added 555 confirmed cases to its ever-growing total, which over the last 1.5 years has surpassed 4,000.

Why are we throwing these numbers at you? Because school started last week in La Pryor and will start this week for Sabinal, Utopia, Knippa and Nueces Canyon. Bells will ring in Uvalde and Leakey a week from tomorrow. COVID-19 vaccines have not been approved for use in children younger than 12, which leaves this population vulnerable to the virus, which has already mutated several times.

For this school year, public school districts can’t offer virtual learning except on a temporary basis to students sickened by or directly exposed to the virus. They can’t require students or staff to wear masks, which are proven effective at hampering virus transmission. And even if a student or a teacher has been sickened with the COVID-19 virus, the state is not requiring schools to quarantine entire classrooms and is instead allowing the parents to decide whether or not to keep their children at home.

Can you imagine how this virus will spread among unvaccinated, unmasked children whose parents aren’t required to keep them home? The only way to emerge from the pandemic once and for all is to not allow the virus to incubate, mutate, and spread within and among us.

As we have stated numerous times, the vaccine not only lessens the chance you’ll contract the virus or become as ill as you would without the protection, it lessens the risk of you passing it along to another person.

So why have more than half of our neighbors put off the shot? If it’s a fear of needles, looking away as the syringe comes nearer helps. If it’s a fear of the unknown, consider this: 47 percent of your neighbors have been the guinea pigs, and we haven’t started shapeshifting, growing horns, or acting any weirder than usual.

Kidding aside, it’s a lot scarier to think about our children gasping for air and suffering long-term effects than it is to become inoculated against a virus. When you consider that this is all preventable, it moves from being scary to infuriating.

And if you’re one of those who say this is no different from the flu, we have good news: People have been getting flu shots since World War II.

Last year, before the COVID-19 vaccines were available and our elders were most at risk, we were pleading with younger people to stay home or at least mask up to avoid bringing harm to at-risk populations. Now that vaccines are widely available and three-quarters of our elders have taken steps to protect themselves and, indirectly, you, we implore you to follow their lead and protect children who are not yet eligible for either of the two-dose vaccines from Moderna and Pfizer or the one-dose Johnson and Johnson option.

Our losses are staggering already.