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Letter: Don’t be silly

Editor, Gazette-Journal:

At 77, I thought I had seen all the silly I would see. I was wrong. In the middle of a deadly and highly contagious COVID-19 pandemic, dozens of gun owners stood shoulder to shoulder in Richmond, breathing on each other and possibly infecting each other with the virus.

They were protesting the closure of gun ranges that was done to protect customers from exposure to the virus that has killed 324 Virginians as of Tuesday. It is difficult, if not impossible to imagine that shooting ranges are essential businesses in the face of a pandemic. It is important to note that no confiscation of anyone’s weapon has been reported.

No Second Amendment rights have been lost.

There is no way to know how many of the protesters had the virus without showing any symptoms and who could have spread it far and wide in the state. An infected person can infect a few people who can, in turn, infect a few more people when they return home. And so on and so on.

Over 9,600 COVID-19 cases have been identified by the Virginia Department of Health, 21 of them in Gloucester and three in Mathews. It has been reported that the illness caused by the virus can last as long as a month. The symptoms include coughing, body aches, and fever among others and can be really dangerous for the elderly and those with other medical conditions. Do you really want the flu for a month? It is hoped that few, if any, protesters contracted this deadly virus as a result of their proximity to one another, but it can’t be assured.

We in Virginia are lucky on two counts: our governor can’t run for a second term, so his actions are in no way aimed at getting votes; and Governor Ralph Northam is a doctor. It makes more sense to follow the medical recommendations of a doctor than a New York real estate mogul with little apparent knowledge of how government works who happens to be the U.S. president and who has been derelict in his duties in this emergency from the start.

I personally take with me to the market a Clorox wipe to clean the grocery cart handle and my hands after putting items in the cart. And I wear a mask which is sprayed with alcohol when removed.

People: Don’t be silly like the protesters. Stay at home, wash your hands often, wear a mask when you have to go out and maintain a reasonable distance from others. Watch TV, play games, read books, do those tasks you’ve been meaning to do, talk by phone or go online to get the latest news of your friends and family and avoid COVID-19. Social distancing works to stop the spread of this virus. Take care.

Katie Thompson

Hayes, Va.