Suffering vs. inconvenience

Re: “Worries rising over child labor,” Oct. 21 news story

If I wasn’t already sick to death of my fellow Americans whining over wearing a mask, missing special events, and now possibly having their traditional holiday meals compromised, I am beyond over it after reading this article.

In case you missed it, let me give you the highlights. Teenage girls in Kenya are taking to the streets as prostitutes to help feed their families during the pandemic. If they get $ 1 per “encounter” they are lucky. More often they are likely to walk away unpaid after a sexual assault and a beating.

A bit less gruesome but no less heartbreaking is a 34- year- old mother whose children ( ages 7, 10 and 12) crack rocks together at a quarry so they don’t starve. This “choice” became necessary after mom lost her cleaning job because of the pandemic.

The U. N. warns that “millions of children may be forced into exploitative and hazardous jobs.”

I’m not blind to the many people here who’ve also had financial hardship inflicted on them, and the many who live in fear of homelessness and hunger because of this virus. Their suffering is also real and they deserve our nation’s collective help. But too many who’ve been only modestly inconvenienced by this pandemic have lost perspective.

So the next time you want to whine about the minor inconvenience of covering your mouth and nose, remember this will pass. But for an

11- year- old Kenyan girl who now sells her body in the hope of making $ 1, her future may never recover.

Lori Vaclavik, Conifer