I would take offense at Kim McGahey calling my qualifications “alphabet soup” but for the pride I feel being lumped in with the public health and county officials he disparaged in his column Tuesday. North Dakota was an example of liberty last summer. Now they are running out of hospital beds with the highest death rate in the nation. Today, experts predict that we will run out of hospital beds and trained health care workers, causing rationing using crisis guidelines in place. Colorado hospital CEOs document hundreds of nurses and doctors sick with COVID-19 in the past two weeks.

True, the death rate is going down with effective treatments, but over half of U.S. citizens are high risk, not just those over 70, due to obesity, diabetes and other comorbidities. Then consider other aspects of this new, barely understood virus. In August, I made a presentation to the World Conference on Covid Research about the “long haul” syndrome and multisystem inflammatory disease in children after COVID-19. The “long haulers experience headaches, shortness of breath, exercise intolerance, diarrhea, taste and smell distortions, and other disabling symptoms for months. We don’t know all the devastating effects this virus can have on your heart, brain, lungs, even after a mild case.

Most families I see every day are doing well, enjoying this opportunity to spend more time together. Distance learning and Zoom meetings with co-workers and grandparents are not the worst thing that can happen. Those who are prospering, like Realtors, can reach out to help those who are hurting, like servers. Getting creative with new ways to learn, earn and live will make us all more flexible in the future.