Readers Write: Vaccines, metal in keys, daylight saving time, rural solar

Opinion editor’s note: Strib Voices publishes letters from readers online and in print each day. To contribute, click here.

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Minnesota children have been lucky so far this year to avoid seeing a measles or pertussis (whooping cough) outbreak. However, if parents don’t start vaccinating their children more than they are, and if the Minnesota Legislature doesn’t eliminate personal-belief exemptions (which allow families to opt out of vaccinations for any reason they believe in), that luck is unlikely to hold (“Measles exploded in Texas after stagnant vaccine funding. New cuts threaten the same across the US,” StarTribune.com, April 13).

So far there have been more than 500 cases of measles in Texas alone this year, with more than 1 in 10 children needing to be hospitalized for further care and two children dying. In addition, we are seeing skyrocketing numbers of pertussis infections nationwide in children over the last four years, including 10 deaths last year. For both measles and pertussis, vaccination rates for children continue to decline and are below the recommended rates (95% of all children being vaccinated) to prevent outbreaks in a community.

Here in Minnesota, for the 2023-2024 school year, only 87% of children entering kindergarten were fully vaccinated with the MMR vaccine that protects against measles and the DTaP vaccine that protects against pertussis. These are down from almost 94% for both vaccines nine years earlier. These vaccines are the only effective way to try and prevent your child from getting measles or pertussis.

Parents: Please get your children vaccinated now.

Sheldon Berkowitz, St. Paul

Secretary of Health and Human Services Robert F. Kennedy Jr. has proposed that the Center for Disease Control run new trials to investigate whether vaccines are causing the uptick in autism among children in the United States. This is a theory that has been debunked for decades by leading scientists in this field of study. This is a man who has no expertise whatsoever in medical science, who acts purely on conspiracy theories and who has spoken out for years that vaccines pose a threat to human health rather than significant benefit.

We should place the blame squarely at the feet of Senate Republicans for confirming this man to this Cabinet post in the first place. This bunch clearly showed where their allegiance lies during the confirmation hearings for Donald Trump’s Cabinet picks. RFK has also talked about eliminating fluoride from the country’s public water supply, a chemical element that was first added to the water back in the 1950s. What will be his next proposal? Perhaps that we should all eat roadkill and drink unpasteurized milk?

Gary Langendorf, Minneapolis

No one disputes the importance of reducing children’s exposure to toxic metals like lead and cadmium. But Minnesota’s new statute banning keys under that justification takes a good goal and turns it into a logistical nightmare (“You carry keys. Are you a criminal?” April 10).

The law now prohibits the sale and even use of keys and key fobs across the state. That includes home and office keys, car keys, bank lockboxes and even emergency vehicle access. We’re talking about virtually every facet of life that requires a lock — rendered illegal without a functional replacement offered by the Minnesota Pollution Control Agency.

Consider public institutions like the University of Minnesota, where lab doors may soon be inaccessible due to a lack of compliant keys. Has the state considered the cost to taxpayers for replacing all affected locks? We’re looking at millions of dollars with no public discussion or plan.

When the MPCA testified on this policy, there was no mention that it would outlaw keys — products never intended for use by young children. That omission is telling. This needs immediate legislative correction. Let’s focus on policies that protect kids without creating chaos for everyone else.

Edward Mann, Minneapolis

The writer is a locksmith.

Remember those dark days of January when the sun doesn’t rise until 7:51 a.m. here in the Twin Cities? Would it be popular and convenient to have the sun come up one hour later at 8:51 a.m. instead? That is what our president wants. President Donald Trump is pushing for permanent daylight saving time (DST) saying the change would be “very popular” and would eliminate a “big inconvenience” (StarTribune.com, April 12).

According to AMA Trustee Alexander Ding, a diagnostic and interventional radiologist, “Eliminating the time changes in March and November would be a welcome change. But research shows permanent daylight saving time overlooks potential health risks that can be avoided by establishing permanent standard time instead. Sleep experts are alarmed. Issues other than patient health are driving this debate. It’s time that we wake up to the health implications of clock setting.”

It might be time to wake up to the implications of the current administration’s overall disregard of scientific evidence. Dark days, indeed.

Jeff Bullard, New Brighton

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Finally, there is something Trump and I agree on: making daylight saving time permanent. He likes more light at night, and so do I. However, not having to change clocks twice a year is merely a matter of convenience. I beg our president and his administration to end the darkness into which they have plunged our country. Their campaign of deportation fear, attacks on diversity, withholding of USAID for starving and dying people, curtailing research, shutting down green initiatives, upending our economy and trampling First Amendment rights are extinguishing Lady Liberty’s torch.

Carol McNamara, Minneapolis

The opinion piece “Minnesota is clinging to an outdated net metering system for solar” (Strib Voices, April 16) doesn’t tell the full story about solar and net metering.

Here is how net metering works. When someone owns a solar array under 40 kilowatts and produces solar power they can’t use, it is delivered to the grid and used by a neighbor. The utility charges this neighbor the retail rate for that power even though the utility didn’t provide it. So, the utility credits the solar owner that same amount. There is no shift; it is a break-even transaction.

Currently this applies to anyone who goes solar no matter who their utility is, but the Minnesota Rural Electric Association wants legislation that allows rural electric cooperatives to pay solar owners as little as 2 to 3 cents per kWh delivered to the grid. This means they will actually profit from the solar owner who made the considerable financial investment to put up solar.

Minnesota’s current net metering policy is key to making solar work on my farm and gives all rural Minnesotans an opportunity to invest in the renewable energy we all need. Gutting net metering would disenfranchise rural Minnesotans of the opportunity to invest in our growing energy needs while addressing climate challenges. If the rollbacks the Minnesota Rural Electric Association is proposing go through, customer-owned solar like I have on my farm won’t happen anymore, and that’s bad for all of us.