Honorable Governor Ivey,
I am a Mississippi citizen and reside in Starkville. I, along with a few colleagues, have been actively promoting the rational, aggressive and conservative management of this ongoing COVID pandemic since June 2020.
As the citizens of Alabama are suffering with this resurgent upswing in alarming infection rates, Mississippi citizens also suffer to an even greater extent. This is due almost entirely due as you bravely and boldly called out last week in your passionate plea to those refusing to be vaccinated. I applaud your efforts immensely and wish to implore you to not despair and to continue in your heroic efforts to responsibly combat this great pandemic.
Ignoring the enormity of the obvious health consequences of this resurgence and its inevitable cost to human life and health, there will be significant and long lasting economic consequences the longer our society is unable to come to terms with conquering the scourge of this pandemic. We must slay this demon yesterday! Alas, that is not possible and neither is it possible to curtail the continuation of surge in drastic numbers of infections.
We must for the moment, ride this tragedy out yet again. We as a society have yet come to terms with the demons that lurk within us all. I regrettably see no or little progress in that regard. (For more detail one may refer to my December 6, 2020 “COVID FATIGUE” Letter to the Editor, Starkville Dispatch and Starkville Daily News.)
No! I correct myself and recognize you again; for you are now my beacon!
Now back to the economic consequences… I read in the newspaper the Federal Reserve Chairman Powell’s assertion that the Delta variant poses little threat to our economy. No one can know that! And it is a baseless assertion based on our collective exuberant optimism at best and mere wishful thinking at worst. There may be need to mislead the public to prevent panic and avoid a “run on the banks” but it is irresponsible to waste the opportunity to scold those among us that their further incalcitrant efforts will inevitably, irreparably harm all
Americans economically in a very significant manner. Their actions are traitorous! One can go on… But what is the point? It has been said and beat to death!
I plead with you to reach out to our Honorable Governor Reeves to enlighten him as he has further entrenched himself and “doubled down” on Tuesday and “tripled downed.” We in Mississippi seem to all too often prefer to wallow in our self-imposed desire to be ignorant of our circumstances and thus we protect your state from the worst of nationwide rankings. As they often say in Alabama: “Thank the Lord for Mississippi.”
Walter P. Okhuysen
Starkville
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