1. Our future is our children. Getting them back into the classroom should be our first priority. According to the SCIENCE, schools that have already been opened around the country have seen no significant increases in COVID outbreaks.

Provide each school with a temp scanner and a health professional to monitor them and provide vaccines in school as we did in the old days. We got a permission slip signed, we lined up in the auditorium, and we took the shot. It seems common sense since they will all be in one building at the same time rather than each individual having to find a place to get the shot! <—Knowing what I do now, I retract this 100%!

2. Parents who are still concerned with sending their children back into the classroom or who have a child with a health condition should be allowed to continue online schooling via CCTV in their child’s live classroom until they are comfortable with sending them back.

We have the technology for this. If governments can afford to provide thousands, even millions of children, with internet and Chromebooks, they can afford CCTV or ZOOM classes from a live classroom to help children still stuck at home stay engaged.

3. Anyone under the age of fifty who does not have underlying conditions and who are WILLING to go back to work should be allowed to do so until vaccines are more readily available. <—I no longer endorse this statement.

The SCIENCE says this virus has over a 99% survival rate. Apparently, grocery store workers and other essential workers have been out there the whole time, and no one seemed too concerned about their well-being. Let the adults, ADULT, and work if they CHOOSE to. Everyone is essential to their families, and they need a steady income, not a damn stimulus check that won’t even cover one month of bills.

4. Our government has abandoned us for its own agendas.

We need to start getting more creative about how to get out of this. Too many people are too comfortable with the way things are, and we need to remind ourselves we all had lives before this pandemic. The only way out is to think outside of the box.

I’m not saying we abandon the elderly and withhold their vaccines in order to get our children back to school. I’m saying we need to prioritize differently as far as moving our lives back to normalcy. Most of our elderly are retired and can continue to shelter in place until more vaccines are readily available. Get our teachers vaccinated, get our children back into the classrooms and vaccinated, and allow healthy people to open their businesses and get back to work. IF you are over fifty and in poor health, shelter in place, and STAY HOME.

Maybe you disagree, and that’s your prerogative, but we have to stop punishing and isolating healthy children and adults NOW. Continue the regular protocols for not coming into contact with the vulnerable, but enough is enough.