After several discussions and a marathon meeting Monday, Durango City Councilors voted 4-1 in favor of a new ordinance requiring the wearing of masks in public places. The ordinance includes penalties for noncompliance ranging from a first-time fee of $50 to a third- or subsequent-offense fine of $500.
Councilor Kim Baxter, while noting that she supports mask-wearing, said she believed the city could have relied upon and enforced existing state and public health regulations.
The Council made the right choice. It is the duty of government to make and carry out sometimes-controversial decisions for the safety of the public at large. Such decisions send powerful messages to the people they govern.
Many Durangoans have not been complying with the governor’s order and public health regulations to wear masks, and in failing to do so, have been wantonly endangering their community and contributing to the now-raging spread of COVID-19. Based on public phone calls during the Council meeting, many believe pseudo-science claims that masks do not help prevent transmission; others feel their rights are being violated by the laws requiring mask-wearing.
Let’s consider the useful analogy of wearing seatbelts.
The last time you got into your car, chances are you put on your seatbelt without giving it a thought. Most of us are used to wearing seatbelts. And it’s the law – one with penalties for noncompliance.
Mask-wearing during this pandemic bears a lot of similarities. Wearing a mask protects the wearer from infection: Check. Mask-wearing protects others: Check. (One study showed that in households where an individual was infected, wearing masks reduced transmission to others by 79%.) Mask-wearing is a public health issue, impacting the entire population: Check. Mask-wearing can save lives and prevent health issues that can have lifelong impacts: Check.
Has anyone reading this ever been in a car crash involving a death or serious injury? Did you have your seatbelt on? Would you advise others to wear a seatbelt? Would anyone with a lick of common sense tell his or her child not to wear a seatbelt?
Numerous “anti-maskers” have been documented from their hospital beds – as they lay dying – begging their loved ones and the public at large to wear masks.
One of the few ways in which this seatbelt-mask analogy doesn’t work is that seatbelts are presumably a forever thing. (Airbags help, but alone don’t do the job.) The good news is that masks are not forever. With widespread use of the coming vaccines, we may be able to unmask by next summer. The inconvenience of mask-wearing will end relatively soon.
And for those of you who don’t believe that mask-wearing is essential, how will you feel if you give your grandmother or your child the virus? Will you consider, for even a moment, that masks might be a good idea? Are you willing to take the deadly risk of being dead wrong?
We are all concerned about job losses, businesses closing, children missing out on their educations. And certainly no one loves wearing masks, or enjoys feeling as if the government is telling us what to do. But survival, and the survival of those we love, trumps all.
Anyone over the age of 50 probably recalls the Ad Council’s peppy public service jingle promoting wearing seatbelts: “Buckle up for safety, buckle up!” One of the lines says, “Show the world you care/By the belt you wear.”
Neighbors, friends, coworkers, family members: Let’s show ourselves and the world that Coloradans and Americans are still made of the right stuff, that we care about each other. Do the right thing. Mask up, and stay well.
