DEAR EDITOR:

Recently, there has been a big escalation in COVID-19 variations. I’m heavily concerned as I have been noticing that not many people are wearing masks when going to classes in-person. I am currently taking four classes, and only one of them provides masks for students who want to wear them.

I firmly believe that every class should provide masks to everyone as an option for safety and protection, for the people who want to wear masks but cannot afford them or don’t have access to them at home or whatever the reason may be.

We are always handling bacteria and germs in our day-to-day lives. Hand sanitizer should also be provided for students and professors to use and have access to. If fewer people are sick, they are more likely to come and participate in school physically, as well as being more prepared to learn. People must be safe about these new COVID variations.

As someone who has recently gotten over COVID, I am constantly sanitizing before and after classes, as well as sanitizing before and after I handle my food. I —and many other students and professors — could benefit from this.

According to The Daily titled “A New Covid Shot for a New Covid Era,” a news podcast posted on New York Times on Sept. 13, Apoorva Mandavilli says, “Older adults really did go out and get it — about half got it. But if you think about adults as a whole, fewer than one in five Americans got it. And that’s just not a very high number.”

Not many people realize how dangerous COVID and all these other different variants are treating people, and it’s not very good. I was lucky enough to get a less severe variant of COVID, but people need to realize that this stuff is heavily contagious and potentially life-threatening.