Dear editor,
I am an essential worker, a transit driver.
This letter is to encourage thoughtful citizens who care about the ongoing health of our communities and all their members - to encourage those thoughtful citizens to nationalize seniors’ care services.
How many COVID-19 kids will grow up without a grandparent? They are victims of this pandemic, and any public health goals that keep seniors’ facilities safer must not be prone to capitalist, profit-maximizing organizations, no matter who owns them.
How many families have been ripped apart by the loss of frontline health care workers? How many have lost friends?
Those health care/senior care workers deserve to be valued as providers of loving care to people that we love.
My dear, old mom lived in a great facility in Kitchener, Ont., and passed lovingly there. Her care was provided by a not-for-profit community organization. Many of our grandparents are not receiving that love at the ends of their lives. Some are suffering. All are suffering loneliness, I imagine.
These working people deserve a living wage, a secure position with good work.
Who knows whether COVID-19 will help us to eliminate ills that keep love from being felt by all.
But there are some things that will not change. People thrive with loving communities. Communities made up of citizens who care about their fellows; who aren’t afraid to step up and share that care.
We are, even now, creating, if only in our minds at first, the kinds of things that will be consistent in my life, as we emerge from this heaven/hell of COVID-19. Science.
Edward Lafleur,
Courtenay
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