Letters To The Editor

Tue., June 2, 1998

HEALTH AND SAFETY

Many helping in anti-hepatitis effort

The Spokane Regional Health District extends a sincere thank you to the citizens, organizations and businesses of the Spokane area for your support and participation during the ongoing hepatitis A epidemic.

Special thanks go to the Department of Motor Vehicle Licensing, American Red Cross, Department of Emergency Management, Spokane’s Veterans Administration Hospital, Spokane County Parking Enforcement office, Spokane city Transportation Department, Metropolitan Mortgage and Securities, and Players & Spectators.

Others we’d like to thank for continuing support are the Spokane Restaurant Association, the Food Advisory Committee and our partners in public health: the Washington State Department of Health and other local health jurisdictions.

We congratulate Spokane food establishments that continue to pay close attention to safe food handling practices, including proper hand washing.

As transmission of this virus occurs most commonly within the home setting, it continues to be important for all of us to pay close attention to safe food handling practices and proper hand washing. Nearly 200 food establishments and several non-food businesses have participated in the hepatitis A prevention program. By providing hepatitis A vaccinations for their employees, participants have reduced the potential for hepatitis A transmission from their businesses.

The current epidemic has affected over 200 citizens this year alone. It might have been worse without the ongoing support and participation of these businesses in the vaccinations program.

For more information about on-site vaccination clinics and certification, call 324-1607. For information about safe food handling practices, call 324-1560 extension 2. Kim Marie Thorburn, M.D., MPH health officer Spokane Regional Health District

Contraception cost should be covered

We appreciate the recent Opinion debate on the important issue of insurance coverage of prescription drugs like Viagra and those for contraception. However, staff writer Vince Grippi’s piece objecting to insurance coverage of women’s contraception demonstrates why women’s health needs are too often trivialized.

Grippi defends coverage of Viagra for the treatment of impotence, noting that for several reasons a man “wants to be able to have sex.” Fair enough. But in arguing against coverage of birth control, he lectures women: “If you don’t choose to have sex, you don’t get pregnant.” Is something missing here? Why are the sexual needs of one gender respected but the other’s dismissed?

Also overlooked is the medical need for contraception. For 30 years of a woman’s lifespan, birth control is not an optional frill - it’s a necessity. The alternatives are multiple, closely spaced pregnancies - a clear health risk. Unintended pregnancies also carry higher risks of pre-term birth, maternal and perinatal morbidity, and higher rates of abortion. Some contraception methods have clear preventative health benefits, and for certain women with serious medical conditions, birth control is literally a life saver.

Grippi also gets his cost-benefit analysis wrong. Contraception brings great financial savings to the health care system, since the alternatives - delivery, abortion, neonatal intensive care - are so much more costly. In fact, right now insurers are relying on women, through their greater out-of-pocket costs, to subsidize the savings to them that contraception brings. This is discriminatory.

Impotence, infertility and pregnancy prevention are all important reproductive health concerns. All deserve insurance coverage. Bruce G. Hopkins, M.D. Fellow of the American College of Obstetrics and Gynecology

REMEMBRANCE

Snack sales, parking fees inappropriate

Saturday afternoon, I went to visit the Wall on display at the Arena. I decided to park on a side street. As I was walking toward the area where the Wall was located, I passed the east entrance to the parking lot and discovered, and was appalled, that a parking fee of $3 was being charged.

I don’t know what company is responsible for parking at the Arena, but all I can say is shame on you! Is the almighty dollar more important to you than people’s feelings? This was a time when people could come and remember, reflect and say a final goodbye to their loved ones killed in a senseless war, not a time to try and make more money off of people.

Once I got down to the Wall, I also noticed a sign on one of the doors read: “Concessions on sale inside.” Excuse me? This was not a sporting event or concert. I fail to see the reason to again make money off of people. Do people have to eat every time they go out in public?

I hope the next time something like this comes to Spokane, certain groups will not be so quick to make an extra dollar. Barbara R. Beck Colbert

The Wall is an experience

It was a long preparation. I put on a good suit and tie out of respect and polished my shoes. Appearance-wise, I was ready. Mentally, I was on shaky ground. I was going to see the Wall.

A notice said to be respectful, that this was sacred ground. Friends, relatives and children stood with men on canes, crutches and in wheelchairs, some carrying wounds you couldn’t see; they moved quietly, even reverently, along the Wall. I did, too, looking for names I didn’t want to find. I didn’t look very hard; I’d rather hope they made it.

Someone’s grandchild tracing a name. A young woman with her fingers touching the Wall, tears running down her cheeks. Perhaps her mother standing next to her, matching her tears.

A veteran copying one name after another, his grim countenance speaking volumes. Another veteran in a wheelchair digging into his pockets for every last nickel to put into the donation box.

I began to feel angry. There were people missing here: the people who called our soldiers “baby killers” and other unprintable epithets, ones who spit on returning soldiers. They should be here! They should be ashamed! They should know humility and disgrace. They took more from our veterans than any enemy could.

But the anger passed. This was the “Wall of Healing,” and the healing was tangible. It was also a wall of forgiving. I couldn’t help but believe that those whose names hold up that wall and give it life, and the veterans visiting it are the ones doing the forgiving. Every one, a hero. David Bray Spokane

Memorial Day is for veterans, period

Editor Chris Peck’s commentary in the May 25 paper quite missed the mark. Memorial Day is to honor those who gave their life for this country, not anybody’s loved ones who passed away.

Let’s keep it a patriotic holiday, not a general day of remembrance for everyone. Robert H. May Veradale

BELIEFS

Views in harmony with Unitarians’

I empathize with Bev Vorpahl’s struggle to fit into her church community once her values no longer matched theirs and I applaud her ability to stand up for what she feels is right, even at the risk of losing her life-long community.

There is a church in the Spokane area where I think she would feel very comfortable and accepted: the Unitarian Universalist Church. A basic principle of the UU church is a belief in the inherent worth and dignity of every person. Another is a free and responsible search for truth and meaning.

We welcome questioning people and recognize that no one person or organization has all the answers. We come together in our search for truth and to support each other on our journey through life. Linda S. Moulder Cheney

‘I admire her guts’

Kudos to Beverly Vorpahl for her commentary, “Goodbye, church.” It is the most powerful, honest, courageous article I have ever read.

She speaks for me and many others I know who are either afraid to stand up and be counted or won’t sign their name.

I admire her courage and guts. Virginia L. Hindin Spokane

Commentary brought tears, gratitude

Re: Beverly Vorpahl’s May 23 article.

She was in my prayers today. I prayed to God in gratitude for her. Her courage and her wonderful witness. I was in tears reading her words. She is the kind of Christian I want to declare I am. Catharine D. Scherer Spokane

GOVERNMENT AND POLITICS

Gingrich disgrace to party, country

After 45 years as a voting Republican, I am faced with a quandary.

Where are some our Republican leaders going in their quest for - what? - Glory? Power? Popularity a la movie stardom?

Lest there be misunderstanding, I neither like nor trust either of the Clintons. However, here comes the quandary: House Speaker Newt Gingrich appeared before the Israeli parliament in Tel Aviv (on the day following U.S. Memorial Day) and supported the Israeli Prime Minister’s rejection of the official U.S. plan for Israel to cede back to the Arabs part of the territory seized from the Arabs. Thus trashing a diplomatic tradition of U.S. officials never criticizing U.S. policy while visiting a foreign land, ol’ Gingrich roughhoused the current administrations’s careful efforts to bring peace to the devastated inhabitants of Palestine.

Congratulations, Gingrich! Several suitable labels for you come to mind. Jackass is one. Traitor comes perilously close.

The beleaguered citizens of that pitiful, bloodied area of the Middle East search for some kind of peace and you appear in Israel and denounce your own country’s ongoing policy before the Knesset. Gee, Gingrich, you chose a good time, too - the day after Memorial Day in this country. It’s the day when your country celebrates the sacrifices of all the servicemen who died for it.

I may reconsider my political affiliation after all these years. But you don’t really care, do you? Trouble is, neither do the Clintons.

And that’s the true quandary. Paul G. Wilson Hayden Lake, Idaho

Blame for lapse spreads wide and deep

Speaking as an American veteran, I cannot help but feel disgusted when the president of the United States spews forth meaningless platitudes at a Memorial Day celebration after it has been revealed that he stood by while technology for weapons of mass destruction have been given to the totalitarian military regime of Communist China, arguably now the most powerful military force on the planet.

How many more dead will be memorialized in the future if those ICBMs now aimed at this nation are ever launched? And yet, I cannot blame our president.

I take that blame upon myself for not taking to the streets to protest this act of treason and threat to world peace. I blame my fellow citizens who, unlike the people of China, still have the right to speak out against the crimes against humanity perpetrated by our world leaders.

I blame those who remain silent. But even more, I blame those who make excuses for a president who was elected on the basis that character and adherence to principle were unimportant and that politicians can’t be expected to be truthful, that the economy and the almighty dollar were all that really mattered.

What kind of example are we setting for our youth with our complacency? We’re telling them there is no good or bad, no right or wrong, that ethics and virtues are situational and that we as a nation will never again have to find fault in our leadership as long as our expectations are sufficiently low. Ron Yorke Spokane

Urge passage of bill to help Africans

Every day when I read of conditions in other parts of the world, I thank God I live in the United States.

I look at my healthy grandchildren and shudder to think of conditions in places like Africa. In March, President Clinton traveled to Africa to promote increased trade and investment. Unfortunately, there is little U.S. trade and investment in Africa now, and most of what there is doesn’t directly benefit most Africans. In subSaharan Africa, most people are farmers tilling no more than five acres of land.

Congress will be considering a bill called Africa: Seed of Hope Act, HR 3636. This legislation would support community based programs that empower small-scale farmers to improve their circumstances. A small loan of $50 to $100 can enable an African woman to produce more food, educate her children and repay the loan. This bill would direct funding to microcredit and other selfhelp programs. It would support agricultural research and extension programs that provide vital information to farmers about how to increase production.

When you sit down to supper tonight, think of African children with empty stomachs. Then call or write your representatives in Congress, urging their support for HR 3636. I can think of no better place for our tax dollars than helping people help themselves. Jo Austin Hayden

Don’t sell out freedom for security

Is anyone paying attention to the conflict going on right now? It’s not between the haves and the have nots, not between Congress and the administration, and certainly not between Democrats and Republicans. It’s between authoritarian statism and prosperity economics.

It’s not complicated. You either want to be responsible for yourself in a free economy or you want the state to be responsible for you in a controlled economy. When your parents took care of you, they made a lot of decisions for you. Do you really think the state will act differently?

The military takes care of its own. But, did any of us think of ourselves as free while in the service? I think not! Ultimately, it came down to this: Do as you’re told and we’ll feed, house and clothe you. Do your own thing and you’ll go to jail. Do you really think the state will act any differently?

Tell your representative and senators you favor prosperity economics and freedom. Doing nothing will deliver us into authoritarian statism. Just remember, life is hard and freedom is frustrating, but that’s what makes them both worth fighting for. Jon J. Tuning Spokane

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Jesse Tinsley

Meet Jesse Tinsley. As a certified drone pilot, this veteran Spokesman-Review photographer often can be seen capturing beautiful aerial photographs of our region. Sometimes though, the job requires getting down with the dogs.
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