To the Editor:
Re “Two Parents. Two Kids. Two Jobs. No Child Care,” by Farhad Manjoo (column, April 23):
As my husband said to me the other day, “We’ve stopped parenting.” In some ways it’s easier. I keep reminding him, so what if the kids miss a few months of school? They are smart kids and this won’t set them back.
But now, as the pandemic wears on, I am beginning to waver. I have three teenagers currently doing “remote learning.” Most days that means checking Google Classroom to see if your teacher has posted an assignment, and if there’s homework that’s maybe another 90 minutes. Then there’s the rest of the day.
The other day my older son shaved my younger son’s head. With the dog clippers. I had a Zoom call and didn’t emerge from my office until it was too late.
When people start to talk about not being able to return to school next fall, I do begin to panic. My husband, a professor, is also working from home. What if his school doesn’t reopen? And my daughter is graduating from college next month, and when she arrives home, jobless and depressed, where is she even going to sleep? Her room has been my office for the past year.
As Mr. Manjoo points out, we need to get kids (and husbands in my case) back to school before we can actually get back to work. Can we start with testing for students and teachers first?
Gayle Gilman
Santa Monica, Calif.
Compensation Fund for Next of Kin
To the Editor:
I read “A Hospital Worker’s Tragic Final Texts” (April 17) with a sense of profound sadness. The nation owes a debt of gratitude to all of the health care workers and first responders at the forefront of the current efforts to deal with the Covid-19 pandemic.
Congress should fund a national fund to compensate the loved ones and next of kin of all of the first responders and health care providers who have given their lives in the line of duty. The precedent for this has been set by the generous response to the victims of 9/11.
Bruce M. Pastor
Weston, Mass.
The writer is an assistant professor of medicine at Harvard Medical School and a senior physician at Beth Israel Deaconess Medical Center.
Health Care Sharing Ministries
To the Editor:
“Christian Health Sharing Group Is Target of Customer Lawsuits” (news article, nytimes.com, April 21) shines light on the reportedly deceptive practices of Aliera, a for-profit company, and its front group, Trinity Healthshare. These companies have masqueraded as health care sharing ministries. Real health care sharing ministries have reliably provided affordable health care options for decades.
True health care sharing ministries are nonprofit, 501(c)(3) organizations that allow like-minded individuals to come together to share medical expenses as part of a supportive faith community. More than a million Americans choose these groups as a values-based alterative to the health insurance model for their medical expense needs, sharing more than $2 billion in medical expenses every year.
The Alliance of Health Care Sharing Ministries is devastated by stories of Americans who have been misled by shadowy, for-profit entities purporting to be Christian — both because of their personal suffering, and because such scams threaten to tarnish legitimate health care sharing ministries, which faithfully help families bear one another’s medical and spiritual burdens, with low-cost, high-quality service.
Katy Talento
Washington
The writer is executive director of the Alliance for Health Care Sharing Ministries and a former senior health care adviser to President Trump.