Protests may have spread coronavirus

An interesting article on the front page of the paper. It went into many reasons what doctors and others believe are the causes for the increase cases of the virus in young people. Certainly increased testing of people has played a part in that increase. In general it appears that younger people under 35 tend to wear masks less and break the 6-foot social distancing guidelines that is recommended more often. Many of the jobs they hold place them in front of the public daily. That is the impression I get on the day or two a week that I venture out in public being in that high risk age group over 65.

What did surprise me about the article was the total absent of any mention that both the lawful and unlawful (rioting and looting) protesting that swept across our country in major cities after the awful video of George Floyd being killed by Minneapolis Officer Derek Chauvin on May 25 likely played a part in that jump in virus cases.

Our nation has had protesting going on for about five weeks now with large gatherings of people. Many of those people can be seen not wearing masks, not that the masks would help with the yelling and shouting going on. Social distancing guide lines have all been forgotten during the protests. I strongly suspect that the protests have helped spread the virus throughout the country.

Gary Eagleton, Woodland

Defense department to charge fees for TRICARE

I am a retired Air Force master sergeant. I write this letter with disappointment and disgust and urge your immediate action. Please stop the Department of Defense plans to begin charging fees for the TRICARE Select healthcare option for which the DoD has announced it will begin charging military retirees, their families, and military survivors starting Jan. 1.

Military healthcare has always been a major recruiting and retention program. The DoD already offers something called TRICARE Prime for which this group of beneficiaries already pays--by choice. Prime is an HMO-type option for which beneficiaries elect to pay an annual fee for guaranteed, expanded healthcare. There is no such guarantee of service under TRICARE Select, and the availability of civilian healthcare providers willing to work under TRICARE Select (if any) will significantly vary from area to area. In other words, the DoD wants to charge a monthly fee for military retirees for TRICARE Select which beneficiaries may or may not be able to use. That is the main reason that Congress has denied the DoD’s requests in the past.

In the past, the DoD has tried to institute user fees for TRICARE Standard/Extra, which Congress has appropriately denied. So, the DoD renamed the program “TRICARE Select” and, apparently, Congress fell for it and is now going to allow monthly fees. Both TRICARE Select and the previous TRICARE Standard/Extra are fee-for-service programs. If you use it, you pay designated co-payments. If you don’t use it, you don’t pay any monthly fees.

Please stop the DoD from instituting these fees for TRICARE Select. They are entirely inappropriate and will for the first time eliminate the notion of an “earned” military healthcare benefit.”

Karen Foster, Woodland

Conflicted over mail-in ballots

I’m conflicted about writing a letter to the editor about mail-in ballots. I think the two sides are talking past each other. I love voting absentee, I have no problem with it. My daughter moved to New York in 2007. Every election I get a sample ballot in her name at my house. I’ve also gotten at least two jury summons to which I reply on her behalf and try to get them to clear her name from their records. Newsom’s order would send a ballot to “every registered voter.” Does that mean a ballot in my daughter’s name is coming this fall? If so, that is in an invitation for fraud. I’ve only seen sporadic and infrequent mention of making sure voter roles are cleared of all but recent voters, deleting dead and moved away voters in the many news and opinion articles on the topic.

I don’t think the county registrars have the staffing capacity to cull the voter rolls, they certainly haven’t caught on with my daughter. When my daughter’s ballot arrives do I write my letter to the editor then? If I do, and I were tempted to test the system by trying to vote on her behalf, the county registrar would probably be alert enough to keep an eye out for her ballot based on my name being in the paper and so my potential smoking gun to prove the invitation for fraud would be nullified. Can someone please dig deeper with investigative reporting on how rigorously the gate-keeping on eligible “registered voters” is going to work? The 17 days allowed after the election for mail in ballots to be received seems excessive, and just seems suspicious to me for what skulduggery could occur, giving much time for party operatives to drop in on voters and say “would you like me to process your ballot for you?” Most of the blather I read saying there is nothing to worry about and Trump is mistaken doesn’t address my concern, in my opinion.

Ron Mikalson, Woodland