A lighted sign at the corner of North Pleasant Street and Thatcher Road on the University of Massachusetts campus reminds people of habits necessary to control the spread of the coronavirus.
A lighted sign at the corner of North Pleasant Street and Thatcher Road on the University of Massachusetts campus reminds people of habits necessary to control the spread of the coronavirus.

Here’s a question for the town or Amherst and UMass public health officials who continue to insist that “encouragement and education” is more effective than enforcement (“blaming and shaming”) when it comes to the COVID agreements that off-campus students have signed.

Which studies is this policy based on? Were these studies focused on self-harming behaviors, such as substance abuse, or were they focused on the spread of highly communicable diseases that have deadly consequences for entire communities? To my mind, there’s a big difference.

The stakes are high, and we don’t seem to be getting this right.

Lynne Weintraub

Amherst