Alderperson Vered Meltzer’s Invocation At 09/01/2021 Common Council Meeting – “Instead of asking how soon we can stop wearing masks, let’s ask how long we are willing to wear masks.”

The issue of masking has been talked about a lot recently due to the Health Officer resolution, the recent AASD mask mandate, and the start of the school year. Alderperson Vered Meltzer (District 2) gave the invocation during the 09/01/2021 Common Council meeting and took the opportunity to address masking.

Mayor Woodford: Tonight’s invocation will be delivered by Alderperson Meltzer.

Alderperson Meltzer: We talk a lot about kindness. We talk a lot about the importance of being kind to each other. Kindness is defined by the Oxford Dictionary as “the quality of being friendly, generous, and considerate.” Kindness to others can also sometimes involve self-sacrifice. We are still in the midst of a pandemic. We’ve lost 65 people in our community to Covid-19. More than 9,500 people have been infected with the virus in Appleton. And many people continue to experience adverse health impacts after their infection is over. But we have tools now that we didn’t have at the beginning. We understand which safety precautions are effective and which are unnecessary. Now we need to apply what we’ve learned over the last year and a half, so that the toll on our community is not repeated. We’ve learned that Stay At Home orders are damaging in many ways, especially to mental health and the economy. We’ve learned that vaccinations reduce hospitalizations and death. And we’ve learned that masking lowers transmission rates. Since almost half of our community remains unvaccinated and breakthrough cases of vaccinated individuals have occurred, wearing a mask is all the more important. The easiest, most generous, and considerate thing that we can do right now is wear a mask. Whether one is vaccinated or not, wearing a mask is helpful. It is not a political statement. It’s a way to say that we care about those around us, and that even if we feel we’re already personally safe for whatever reason, we recognize that this pandemic is a problem bigger than ourselves. Instead of asking “How can we get back to a sense of normalcy as quickly as possible?”, let’s ask ourselves how we can work together to prevent the suffering of our fellow community members as much as possible. Instead of asking how soon we can stop wearing masks, let’s ask how long we are willing to wear masks.

During World War II there was a great cultural outpouring of unity and team effort. In a lot of ways, that defined the American personality–people who roll up their sleeves and are undaunted by making personal sacrifices for the sake of the common good. That defines patriotism. And that’s the spirit we need to embrace as a community in order to meet the challenge of new virus variants and keep our local economy alive and keep each other safe from illness. During World War II, Americans made huge sacrifices for each other. We rationed our food and planted victory gardens and changed our diet and caloric intake significantly. We changed our consumer habits and our lifestyles quickly and eagerly. We changed our workplaces and set aside our personal career goals in order to serve the common good. We came together to support each other’s sacrifices and celebrate our cooperation and unity. We need to embrace this spirit of team effort for the common good or we may never see the end of Covid-19 mutations–each new wave more frustrating and heartbreaking than the last. Our hospitals are filling up. Our ICUs are filling up. Just today I spoke to someone whose wife has to deal with the painful delay of a necessary surgery because the hospitals just cannot accommodate her right now because there are so many Covid patients. Hospitals are struggling to retain staff, and healthcare workers are exhausted. A friend of mine in a southern state lost his father last week because he couldn’t be admitted to a hospital for a lifesaving surgery. He was transferred to a hospital across state lines, but by then it was too late. My heart breaks over this, and I don’t want to see this happen in Appleton.

How can we help each other get through these hard times? It’s a sacrifice to wear a mask, but it’s not a big sacrifice. Masks are simple and easy and accessible. There are many different kinds of masks including face shields and gaiters and even the less effective styles of masks are still more helpful than no mask at all. We can take off our mask to drink or eat or speak and we can make sure that our masks fit comfortably. Masks are annoying but they make a difference. Every infection that can be avoided makes a huge difference–possibly a life or death difference for the infected person or someone else. It’s a sacrifice to conform to any dress code. We make many sacrifices on a regular basis in our daily lives. We make sacrifices in order to live together in civil society. We do it because we care. We do it in order to have a community. We need each other’s care, we need each other’s kindness, and we need each other’s help right now. So, please, be friendly, be generous, be considerate. Please, wear a mask.”