LETTER: Change incarceration to quarantine

I've noted the daily news reports related to the coronavirus outbreak.

We do have cases in Canada and the fast action of the health-care system has placed those infected into safe quarantine. This has worked well, with no Canadian deaths reported.

On the other hand, missing from the daily reports are the numbers 285 and 92. These are the numbers of monthly overdose deaths in Canada and B.C., from January to June 2019.

Perhaps if we changed the word incarceration with quarantine, the judiciary and those who advocate for leniency would not agonize over the logical action to "quarantine forever," the illicit drug dealers and their suppliers.

Once the source of this problem is mitigated, we then can concentrate on caring for those entrapped in this cycle.

That care will have to take many shapes and will not be cheap, but at least it will bring back dignity and self respect to those stripped of it, sometimes so early in what could have been a bright future.

Mike Thomas

Sooke