Letters to the editor Aug. 19

Booster shots

With a new wave of coronavirus and historical and current data showing some waning of antibody levels after six to nine months, one might question whether a booster shot of vaccine would be helpful. Apparently Pfizer has done a study showing an 11 fold increase in antibody levels after a booster in patients aged 65 -75. Perhaps they initiated that study after some data showed that the Moderna vaccine may be more effective against the Delta variant than the Pfizer.

We also know from real data that immunosuppressed transplant patients frequently have a poor antibody response to a two shot regimen, but 50% of those have a significant increase in levels after a third dose with no serious side effects or rejection. Other immunocompromised patients such as those with cancer might also benefit.

Around the world, countries including France, Hungary, Turkey, Thailand and others are starting booster programs in select groups and Israel is offering a booster to anyone over 60. While I am sure the globalist liberals will declare this unfair to countries that do not yet have enough vaccine for initial immunization against the virus, as a physician, I would recommend a third dose for anyone over 65, especially those with known health risks for severe disease.

If the Pfizer and Israeli data show significant increases in antibody levels and no additional side effects, as a 74 year old, I would take the booster without reservation. Rather than leading from behind, our day-late-and-dollar short Biden medical advisor, Anthony Fauci, should step away from the cameras and be a brave leader of innovation instead of a fearful and regressive chicken little telling us the sky is falling ... after it is already lying on the ground. Give Americans the facts. We can make the right choices.

—David Myerowitz, Columbia Falls

Code red alert

Yesterday the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change publicized an alarming report entitled “Code Red for Humanity,” written by hundreds of scientists in 195 different countries. It concludes that whatever we do, we’ll still have to endure some effects of earth’s warming for years.

The good news is that if we act quickly and boldly this decade, we can stabilize the climate and avoid even worse heat waves, fires, unhealthy and ugly smoke, closed trout streams, drought, floods, rising seas and more frequent and destructive hurricanes.

The prices of wind and solar electricity have dropped quickly, like the prices of cellphones and flat-screen TVs, and are now the cheapest way to generate electricity. NorthWestern Energy instead proposes to not only run Colstrip long past its expiration date but also to build a huge new dirty methane fueled generating plant.

Why? Probably because the stockholders will make money burning the gas NWE already owns and, as a monopoly, NWE will earn a guaranteed profit by building another plant. Meanwhile, everybody’s health, agriculture and tourism in Montana, and even the planet as we know it are put at risk.

What’s wrong with this picture?

—Jerome Walker, Missoula