I read with interest the comments of Adam Kanczula regarding his views of those who are not wearing masks in public.
I don’t disagree we can perhaps do better, but before we shower blessings on his comment perhaps he should have reflected upon a few basic issues.
First, our local grocery stores have made extraordinary efforts to control traffic and numbers of people in their stores, but time and time again we see people who don’t see the arrows or who, having forgot something, do a 180-degree turn right into others behind them.
We see people who do not have lists but are out on a “shopping as normal” trip who meander down the aisles. They pick up items and put them back out of curiosity with no intention to buy.
When it comes to masks, I returned to B.C. from overseas on March 23 and in the first days while in self isolation and since, I have not found one source of masks locally and I have tried.
Even Walmart is quoting four to six weeks for delivery.
An order I placed April 23 from Amazon has yet to be delivered and likely is still two weeks away.
So while it is easy to be critical of those of us callous, self-centred slobs who are not wearing a mask in public, we are all not so fortunate as to have had access to them.
Yes there is an argument to be made about bandanas, but they are open at the bottom and most of the ones I see in public either end up around the neck, not covering the mouth and nose, or cover the mouth but not the nose.
And yes, if you have a sewing machine and the skills you can make one if you happen to have fabric available, but not all of us are in such a position.
So rather than be critical, how about some recognition that people on the Island and in particular our local area are, for the most part, working hard to maintain social distancing, staying home and generating results that on a per capita basis are better (145 cases/million) than the rest of this province (493/million).
Alex Currie
North Saanich
