Coronavirus is top 2020 story

It’s pretty obvious what the top news story is for 2020.
Since early this year, the COVID-19 virus has consumed the print and broadcast news in our nation, state and city as health and elected officials grappled with how to handle this new worldwide menace that first reared its ugly head in Wuhan, China, and was dubbed “the China flu.”
A side note is that the young female Chinese citizen journalist who first reported to the world on conditions in China due to the virus in Wuhan Province is now serving four years in jail for her efforts. Instead, she should have been awarded a medal, but that is not the way the Chinese Communist Party operates. They tried to keep news of the virus outbreak secret as long as they could.
The Trump administration banned all travel from China to the United States as soon as we learned of the origin of the virus and a White House virus task force was formed to come up with a plan to protect our citizens from its deadly effects. The wheels were set in motion at this time to come up with a vaccine to combat the virus, and we just saw the fruits of these efforts in the development and distribution of a vaccine nationwide in less than a year.
Economic and social damage from this virus has been monumental, to say the least. Virus mitigation efforts were left to individual state governors with varying results. Some governors totally locked down their states by telling residents to stay home and businesses to close their doors, all except big box stores, that is. Those locked-down states are now experiencing another surge in reported virus cases. So much for lockdowns.
Some governors like our own Kristi Noem refused to issue any types of statewide mandates regarding stay-at-home orders or small business closures. Instead, she left it up to local mayors and city councils and school boards to decide what courses of action to take. She left it up to our citizens to implement common sense policies that would work for them and their own communities. For this, she was highly criticized in both local and national media by those who expected the government to tell them what to do.
The governor’s hands-off policies seemed to have worked as our businesses have been open and our citizens free to move about. If you wanted to stay home, you could. If you wanted to wear a mask you could, but you didn’t have to. It’s called personal responsibility and common sense. And, our case numbers and deaths are going down.
In the beginning, people seemed to hang on every word of federal government officials like Dr. Anthony Fauci, director of the National Institute of Allergy and Infectious Diseases. Since first saying we didn’t need to wear masks, and later saying we should, he has lost his credibility as he seems to be moving the goalposts every time he speaks. He and Joe Biden both agree that, in spite of all we have done like social distancing, mask-wearing and lockdowns these past nine months, we still face a “dark winter.”
“A dark winter” now that a vaccine is being distributed to the general population in record time? Fauci discounted proven drugs like hydroxychloroquine as a remedy for the virus, in spite of the fact the drug has been around for 50 years and has been recommended by thousands of physicians. Fauci said the drug needed more testing before it could be prescribed as a virus cure. But he now recommends people getting virus shots from a vaccine that has had little testing and was developed this year.
State and local governmental bodies have tried to sort though the changing messages received from Fauci and the Centers for Disease Control. It hasn’t been easy, but South Dakota and Custer City and Custer School District have made the right calls, which means we should be back on track before the rest of the nation in 2021.
We refuse to jump on “the dark winter” bandwagon and believe we are on the downhill side of this virus. People are tired of living in fear and are ready to get their lives back. Have we been so afraid of dying that we forgot how to live? Let’s hope not. Good riddance to 2020.
Happy New Year and welcome 2021!