I am writing in response to the “Time to open up” letter by Rev. Phill Grant. This time of quarantine is nothing most of us have ever lived through before, and my hope is that we will not have anything like it again in our lives.

This virus is not the flu and not, for example Ebola or HIV. The flu has a vaccine each year that will lessen the chances of most people contracting it. Even when it is not 100% effective, deaths are not very common. Ebola and HIV are transmitted by direct contact with someone who is infected. There are tests to determine infection and there are treatments available.

The coronavirus can be transmitted by touching something that has been touched by an infected person, or an infected person has sneezed or coughed on that surface. These germs may live on a surface up to 14 days. Close contact can spread this disease like wildfire. The big difference from the other diseases mentioned is that some people are infected and they do not know it. They show no symptoms. So they unknowingly spread this deadly virus to others by touching objects and by sneezing and coughing. There is, at this time, not a vaccine or a cure.

Perhaps you are ready to go to your afterlife now. That is your choice. However, it is unfair to take other innocent people with you. These protocols have been put in place to keep people safe and to limit the spread of infection. Those wonderful nurses and doctors, grocery workers, mail carriers, cleaning staff, and all essential personnel are working so that we can continue to live. They are risking their lives and those of the people close to them so that there is mail delivery and a functioning hospital, that places where people have to be are clean, and that there is food and necessities for those of us who are continuing to live. They are going out of their way to make it as safe for us and for them as possible.

Without knowing that one is infected, one may frequent a restaurant, a nail salon, a tattoo parlor and unknowingly spread the disease. If you get sick, you will go to the hospital and perhaps infect others and their loved ones. Is that worth sending kids to school for the next month, playing baseball, or having parties? Maybe in your world.

I would like to live to see my 12-year-old grow up, and go back to socializing when the danger of infecting someone else is small. Where are your priorities? I write this from privilege — I have a continuing salary, a roof over my head, and the ability to isolate. Until there is a vaccine and the scientists have determined that it is safe to go back into the world, I will wait. Life is too precious.

Susan Voss is a resident of Greenfield.