Take the education fight to the Legislature
Minneapolis Public School teachers have every right to strike. They were deprived of meaningful pay increases in both 2019 and 2021. Who is the power broker in this situation? It is not the school board — and certainly not Superintendent Ed Graff.
Only the governor and state legislature can provide the funds teachers are demanding. Local school boards just hand it out. They exist solely to oversee the districts, and have no power to raise money. Any increase teachers receive now would be trivial, and taken from other areas of MPS, which is already in a deficit.
I volunteered with Adriana Cerrillo, Director of District 4 on the Minneapolis School Board, during last year’s budget negotiations to avoid the present situation. When the State Senate GOP proposed defunding public education, a small group of parents, teachers and civil servants from around Minnesota banded together. We phone-banked, wrote letters and took to social media to pressure those blocking attempts at funding schools. While teachers did not receive funds for a meaningful raise, the catastrophe of cutting $600 million from schools was averted.
Politicians are only as powerful as their ability to unify voters. Pushback from a broad, geographically-diverse coalition is enough to make any senator blink. Had enough people joined in to pressure their Republican senators last year, teachers would likely not be striking today.
The GOP wagered that their constituents would put up with underfunding schools. They were right. The power, then, lies with those voters. If we are serious about improving public education, we must make these voters understand how funding cuts hurt everyone. Then we have to organize with them to oust any politician who opposes us. The districts of Senate Education Finance and Policy Chair Roger Chamberlain (38) and former Senate Majority Leader Paul Gazelka (9) are logical starting points.
Or we could just yell at a superintendent.
—Michael Wellvang, Minneapolis
The COVID-19 fight isn’t over
Recently, local and state governments have started to ease COVID-19 rules. And while I am so happy that we seem to be through the worst of another wave, I am writing to remind readers that, for many, the fight isn’t over.
While my COVID symptoms themselves were quite mild, the infection sent my immune system into overdrive, and my body began attacking itself. I developed a fever and pain so severe that my parents admitted me to the hospital, where I was diagnosed with something called multisystem inflammatory syndrome (MIS-C).
For me, this has been a nightmare that just won’t end. A year later, I still have some strange symptoms, and I don’t feel like my health has ever truly rebounded. I rarely feel 100% and everyday tasks can pose massive challenges. And while MIS-C is relatively uncommon, I know I’m not alone in feeling the detrimental long-term side effects of COVID-19. Around the world more than 100 million people are estimated to feel the long-term side effects from the coronavirus. It’s very unsettling to not fully understand this disease and the way it will impact me going forward.
If we want to ensure that young people like me have the brightest futures possible, we need more research into the impacts of COVID-19 and other understudied illnesses like MIS-C. I hope our lawmakers agree and oppose legislation that stands in the way of pharmaceutical research and innovation. Measures like prescription price fixing could ultimately prevent this crucial work, and for the patients with chronic illnesses, like me, this could be disastrous.
—Rachael Busch, Mankato
Appreciation for abortion providers
On March 10, 1993, an anti-abortion extremist murdered Dr. David Gunn, a Florida-based abortion provider . To honor Dr. Gunn’s life and work, and all of the courageous, compassionate people who provide abortions, we observe the National Day of Appreciation for Abortion Providers on the anniversary of that tragic day.
This year, with abortion rights hanging in the balance and access significantly diminished in states around the country, it’s more important than ever that we celebrate the amazing doctors, nurses, and staff members who provide abortion services.
We have already seen a radical abortion ban put into effect in Texas and copycat laws considered in states like Mississippi, Florida, Kentucky, and Ohio. It looks like the Supreme Court may overturn Roe v. Wade this summer, which would likely result in abortion becoming illegal in 26 states.
But we know abortion is essential health care. Abortion access is important to me because my physical and economic health depended on being able to control when and if I had children. Too many of my peers in high school in the 1960s had forced adoptions, abandonment by their own parents, or forced marriages. The fact of their pregnancies meant no college for them. I was very lucky that my own unwanted pregnancy happened in 1974, so I was able to have a safe legal abortion by a real doctor.
Eight in 10 Americans agree that abortion should remain legal. This National Day of Appreciation for Abortion Providers, I want to thank abortion providers everywhere and make it known that abortion should be safe, legal, and accessible to everyone.
—Kit Ketchum, Edina
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I developed the exact same condition you did, Rachael Busch. But I never tested positive for Covid. My doctors at the U think it most likely came from the vaccine.
I highly doubt that. But if so, you should have probably bought a lottery ticket that day. MIS-C is fairly rare after COVID-19 infection (though other post-COVID effects aren’t so rare), but it is many, many, many times more rare following vaccination, either as a result of the vaccine or post-vaccination COVID-19 infection. It’s even more rare in adults (Ms. Busch is a teenager…you are not). Also, I know several people who very likely had COVID-19 but never tested positive, too. Just because TFG tells you that it’ll go away if you don’t test doesn’t make it true.
I didn’t know you were an MD, but mine disagree.
I have lots of respect for MDs (I don’t have an MD, but I do have a PhD). BUT…the vast majority of MDs are not qualified to diagnose a single case of MIS in an adult as being the result of a vaccine (or, frankly, as a result of ANY particular cause at all). I’m certain that none of your MDs are so qualified. (MIS-C is only found in children, by the way. “C” stands for “children.” MIS-A would be what you may have been diagnosed with.) MIS is very rare, but can be caused by a large number of things. Before COVID, MIS happened in children and adults for all kinds of (mostly) mysterious reasons. In order to determine if your case was as a result of the vaccine, your doctors would have needed to do a lot of testing – most, if not all of which, they probably didn’t do. The most common cause of MIS right now is COVID infection. You can be infected with COVID even if you don’t get tested for it (a fact that seems obvious, but apparently isn’t to many). And because MIS can show up several weeks (typically 2 to 6 weeks) after infection by COVID, you can test negative because your viral load is too low and still develop MIS. In fact, MIS (at least in children) is more common after a mild or asymptomatic infection with COVID, so it’s even more likely to miss the positive test window. So, it seems much more likely that you got COVID, which caused MIS, than got MIS as a result of vaccination.
You know who is more qualified to diagnose a case of MIS as being a result of a vaccine? Researchers with millions of data points. So, I thought about whether my comment about you buying a lottery ticket was being flippant. I figured I’d take advantage of my ability to do a literature search in the scientific literature (a skill developed during my PhD studies). A brief, but reasonable hunt for scientific literature that found association between a COVID vaccine (ANY COVID vaccine) and MIS in an adult turned up exactly two results where MAYBE there was a link. One man in Korea and one woman in the UK. In kids, which are more likely than adults to develop MIS, a large study found that in 21 million vaccinated 12-20 year olds, only 21 got MIS-C, and in 15 of those cases, it turns out the kids had COVID despite vaccination. In the other 5, while they could not rule out the vaccine may have contributed to the MIS-C, they could also find no evidence that it did. In all 21 of those cases, the kids were not vaccinated. Other studies showed that COVID vaccination actually reduced the (already ultra low) risk of MIS-C by over 90%. I could find only 1 plausible case of MIS-C in a teenager that might have been caused by the vaccine published just this year. But, for perspective, that’s one in MILLIONS of vaccinated children and adolescents, vs 1 in about 4000 kids who get infected with COVID.
So, yeah. You definitely should have gotten a lottery ticket. Even if your MDs suspected that you got MIS as a result of vaccination (or perhaps nodded and smiled when you suggested that’s what happened), they likely didn’t have any evidence that you didn’t have COVID previously, which is much more likely to cause MIS based on the evidence. Still, that you had MIS at all was such a long shot (prior to 2020, it was hard to study because it was so rare), you really did miss out on that lottery ticket.
Amazing how Covid is now surging in many countries around the world. Even 14 months after trump left office. But yes, the pandemic is all his fault
The idea is to obliterate a virus when first detected. When half the people do not comply with safety measures then the virus goes on its way infecting and changing. So the fact that it is still around is on the people who would not protect themselves and their neighbors. If this is not a fact then why do we not see polio, measles, dypyheria, whooping cough, etc. ? We do not see those diseases because we have vacines that stop them. The only place they may break through is when vacines are not used. I feel sad that a lack of common sense and political bias makes logic a lost art.