I just saw that North Dakota is one of the few states where the COVID vaccination rate is less than 50%. I think this is not surprising, but it reminds me of what happened on our farm when I was young.

My mother always spends about 15 or 20 chickens in the winter. One day, when I happened to be in the chicken coop, a mink came in through the small door of the building. The hen immediately flew to the uppermost habitat, trying to reach safety. Actually, this is not so safe, because the mink killed one before I returned with 0.22. However, the point of this story is that every chicken has enough consciousness to try to get rid of the harm.

You should consider that chickens are really not that smart. However, if you compare their behavior with the behavior of anti-vaccineists, I am sorry, but in my opinion, anti-vaccineists look stupid.

But there is more: Americans may have more guaranteed rights than anyone else in the world, but in addition to these rights, as citizens of this great country, we also have responsibilities. It may not be written down, but we should respect and care about our friends and family, our colleagues and other members of our community, and other people living in this country. Instead of working together to end this pandemic, we have turned the COVID vaccine into a political football that divides the country and puts innocent people at risk.

We lose a thousand people every day due to this disease. I hope we can wake up, get the vaccine, and then forget all this COVID nonsense.

Tom Osowski, Minto, ND