To the editor:

This “coronavirus epidemic”, as it is being referred to, is top of the news every day and has gotten many people in near panic mode.

Air travel has been shut down to several countries and cruise lines are pretty much shut down as well. Sports events and concerts where thousands of people gather, currently being discussed, may be affected in the same way. The stock market has become a roller coaster daily.

There are bits of information coming from sources that say this is not a natural mutation of a virus, but was a “creation” by a small group of scientists, either by accident or for a purpose. Until verified complete information comes to light, it is futile and dangerous to speculate further .

President Trump’s Administration has taken the steps necessary to gather top scientists from nearly, if not, all the pharmaceutical companies in the country to work together to find the antidote to this virus at an estimated cost of a little over two billion dollars. Not to be outdone, some politicians demanded that it will take over eight billion. So, eight billion it is. Now that the cost is four times higher, apparently, the cure will come four times as fast. Funny how politicians, non-scientists if you will, can foresee that the solution to any problem is to spend more money. But I digress.

Not since the late 80s into the 90s has America had such a robust rebirth of our economy, however, with this “epidemic” it is being affected and not in a good way. Rather than everyone working together for a common goal to find the cure, political sides have been chosen to see who takes credit or who’s to blame.

The back and forth of the politics of this is front and center while people are dying or at deaths door. Businesses and their employees are negatively affected along with peoples retirement and savings . The seriousness of this should be front and center to find the antidote, not political posturing and positioning.

Roger Baumann

Wabasso