Taking stock of our lives and finding a better way forward

'Tis the season when we take stock of our lives and wonder if we are better off. In some ways, our lives as Americans are much better now. In other ways, we're in worse shape. Today, we have COVID-19 vaccines, which work and are widely available. The vaccines were developed at "warp speed" during Donald Trump's time in office and deployed rapidly under Joe Biden's watch. Both presidents deserve credit for their actions, which are saving lives. Today, in Washington state, three out of four citizens have received at least one COVID-19 vaccine and two-thirds are fully vaccinated. While the numbers are impressive, far too many people are still dying and a high percentage of the deaths are among the unvaccinated. The Kaiser Family Foundation found the SARS-CoV-2 virus is deadly for all age groups in our country. The Foundation also found that, between June and November of this year, vaccinations could have prevented as many as 163,000 COVID-19 deaths in the United States. This month, the Foundation published data showing there have been nearly 700,000 vaccine-preventable COVID-19 hospitalizations in this country between June and November 2021, and that the cost of treating unvaccinated COVID-19 patients during those six months was around $13.8 billion. The good news is we are better at stopping COVID-19 than we were preventing polio in the 1950s. It took years to develop and test vaccines, and things didn't always work. In 1954, an early batch actually caused a polio outbreak. The vaccine was perfected by Dr. Jonas Salk, head of the Virus Research Lab at the University of Pittsburgh. "By August 1955, some 4 million shots had been given. Cases of polio in the U.S. dropped from 14,647 in 1955 to 5,894 in 1956, and by 1959, some 90 other countries were using Salk's vaccine," according to the "This Day in History" website. While Americans are exhausted from the COVID-19 pandemic, the comforting news this year is the vaccines work. However, many people are frustrated by constant vitriolic bickering and intolerance and "cancel culture." As a result, many citizens just don't trust politicians or media, believing both to be out of touch and tone deaf. An October Gallup Poll found "less than half of U.S. adults (44 percent) say they have a great deal or fair amount of confidence in people who hold or are running for public office, rivaling the record low of 42 percent from 2016." A Dec. 20 NPR/PBS NewsHour/Marist poll shows Biden's approval rating has dropped to its lowest point, with 41 percent of respondents approving of the president at the end of his first year in office. Lack of trust and confidence in elected officials and media is a major problem. "Americans' trust in the media to report the news fully, accurately and fairly has edged down four percentage points since last year to 36 percent, making this year's reading the second lowest in Gallup's trend," MSN announced recently. Where are the trusted journalists - the Walter Cronkites who reported the news and were not the news? When I started as a reporter for daily newspapers in the 1960s, editors insisted that we report the news accurately from all perspectives. The editorial page was reserved for opinions. Today, the line separating news reporting from opinion is so obfuscated among the major mainstream media, it is nearly invisible. Where are the civic, government, labor and business leaders such as the groups that staged Seattle's World Fair in 1962 and Spokane's 1974 Expo? We grew up in a small town outside a larger city in Montana. Elected officials, business leaders and labor unions, and politicians would argue vigorously and disagree, but in the end they would find ways to solve problems. They built communities and took pride in their cities and towns. Smashing windows, looting stores and ripping business districts apart was unthinkable and intolerable. This year, the best present America can receive is restoration of trust, civility, respect, and confidence in our political, civic, business, media and labor leaders. Don C. Brunell is a business analyst, writer and columnist. He retired as president of the Association of Washington Business, the state's oldest and largest business organization, and now lives in Vancouver. He can be contacted at theBrunells@msn.com.

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