Neighbours, friends will help us get through this
Letters to the editor may be the best-read section of the newspaper, other than obituaries, that is.
Lately, of course, discussions of social isolation and virus protection have dominated.
Some letters, though, provide hope in these troubled times.
Being required to stay at home most of the time, we’d like to think, will force people to seek out their neighbours for opportunities to lift spirits or share experience.
In Halifax, a note from two students to their elderly neighbours offering to do some shopping if they need it led reader Wayne Bennett to write, “After some small talk about our backgrounds and our shared university backgrounds, we agreed to look out for each other until our world returns to a new normal. Wouldn’t it be wonderful if we all adopted such a spirit? We have to be there for our neighbours.”
Wouldn’t it, indeed?
There are other hopeful signs. A group of students from Dalhousie have banded together to offer to run errands for harried health workers. A truck driver in Saskatoon picked up toilet paper in small towns on his route and handed them out for free to people at home. Distillers are producing free hand sanitizer.
Facebook caremongering sites are popping up all over.
The Halifax version, for instance, shares ideas and offers for help among city-dwellers.
Several more exist in Nova Scotia, in Kensington and Bedeque, P.E.I., and in St. John’s, N.L.
They’re worth a follow if only to view the uplifting messages, workout tips, bits of fridge art, photos of pets, and videos of people trying to cope. And the rules of engagement on the group ask commenters to refrain from argumentative posts, instead offering supportive messages.
All of our member papers are telling these stories in addition to the regular updates from health officials both provincial and federal.
The Cape Breton Post reported on a New Waterford taxi company which is waiving fares on all trips to the Sobeys grocery store and area pharmacies.
It is also delivering groceries for free to people who want to self-isolate.
In addition, three Glace Bay community groups have joined forces to create a volunteer buyyour-supplies for you service, if you need to selfisolate for any reason.
And for a glimpse of a light at the end of the tunnel, China reported on Thursday that no new domestic transmissions of COVID-19 were reported for the first time since the outbreak began.
Travel and quarantine restrictions are slowly loosening there.
That indicates that the measures our governments are taking should work to contain the spread of this virus in time.
Think about it this way: this is an experience shared by billions of people all over the world.
If that doesn’t bring us together, nothing will.