Letter to the editor: Get a shot

Over our many decades of service Rotary International has supported global public health initiatives, the most significant being the more than 35 years of effort to eradicate polio. Our goal of ridding the world of this disease is closer than ever.

As a founding partner of the Global Polio Eradication Initiative, we’ve reduced polio cases by 99.9 percent since our first project to vaccinate children in the Philippines in 1979.

We have seen through the polio initiative and other public health efforts the success of vaccines to prevent and eliminate illness. Rotary has decades of experience in supporting the distribution of polio vaccines as well as highlighting their power and efficacy, which is a critical reason why polio is on the brink of eradication. It’s with this experience Rotarians have the confidence to encourage everyone in our communities, who is eligible, to get the Covid vaccine as soon as it’s available to them.

It is estimated it will be necessary to vaccinate from 70 to 80 percent of the population to achieve herd immunity. In the coming months, the vaccines will be available to do this. We are all anxious to get back to some semblance of normal in our daily lives and we’re seeing clear signs of hope with the expanding Covid vaccination campaign, but it will take everyone doing their part. When it’s your turn to be vaccinated please do so, and encourage family, friends, and neighbors to do the same so we can put an end to the Covid-19 pandemic.

Dave Kauma, president, Rotary Club of Cloquet

Co-signed by eight other

presidents in the region