OPINION

Lockdown madness?

While I would disagree the election of the Democrats should make Americans as proud as they have ever been of their country, given that Covid-19 cases were higher in Democrat than Republican states, I would say that Eric Bahrt in his two letters, "Barbaric lockdowns", and "American and proud", does have a point when he says that the way that lockdowns have been imposed has been nothing short of atrocious.

Both South Korea and Sweden have never imposed wholesale lockdowns, as he points out; yet, if anything, the data suggests that fewer people have been affected by the coronavirus here than in other Western nations. And I might add that Taiwan has never imposed a wide-scale lockdown, yet they seem to have been doing remarkably well.

So when one considers the incredible loss of jobs and livelihoods that lockdowns impose on people, and the fact that few young get it, does it really make sense to impose such stringent conditions on both workers and students alike? One would think not.

Doing things such as targeting specific populations such as the elderly, and contact tracing seem to be as effective in controlling Covid-19, as lockdowns are.

Buying licence to kill

Re: "Retest senior drivers for road safety", (Opinion, Jan 27).

The article makes an interesting read. But are senior drivers really a threat to the safety of others? I think not.

The entire system of obtaining a driver's licence should be under review, and the ease at which one obtains a driver's licence needs to be questioned. Many of my friends simply slipped 1,000 baht banknotes to their inspectors. Younger drivers are the biggest threat with their urges to speed, to drink, and to ignore road safety rules.

In Canada it takes up to three years to get a driver's licence in graded steps. In Thailand it takes all of three minutes.

Freedom still exists

The headline, "Life will be different with Biden", (BP, Jan 22) emphasises the latent fear of Thai authorities towards the Biden administration. As champions of human rights, the Prayut government has nothing to be afraid of, if it avoids harassing the mostly young protesters.

One wonders why the alarming tone. This is a country of freedom and democracy.

Perhaps rethink this

Re: "[ROC] air force flexes its muscles after incursion", (BP, Jan 27).

The Republic of China on Taiwan might want to think about renaming its F-CK-1 Ching-kuo Indigenous Defence Fighter plane. Some low-minded readers might mistakenly assume that the first hyphen in its current name represents a missing vowel.