I am deeply concerned about the children of Hawaii who are attending in-person school while the COVID-19 delta variant is spreading like wildfire.

There is no social distancing in classes. Children are sitting next to each other for an entire class period breathing the same air.

Children should be home where it is safe. Online virtual learning with teachers is the best option now.

Gov. David Ige limits social gatherings to 10 people indoors and 25 people outdoors. Schools can have 30 students in a classroom and crowded hallways during class changes. This is not safe.

Please get the students out of in-person school before the delta variant sweeps through campuses, bringing more patients (our children) to the already overflowing hospitals.

Dr. Anthony Fauci said, “Now, you have a virus that does a big and better job of infecting anybody much more efficiently than the previous virus — including children.”

Diane Favreau-Chung

Mililani

Children already take numerous vaccines

With all the focus and controversy over the COVID-19 vaccine, it’s appropriate to look at vaccines in general.

The state Department of Health lists nine immunizations required for K-12 students. The overwhelming majority of the population has taken most or all of these vaccines, so we already are loaded with vaccines.

It should not be that difficult to add one more vaccine, COVID-19, to the list for children and for adults to take.

Brice Conquest

Waialae-Kahala

Don’t build fish farm; choose plant-based diet

Can’t we just leave our oceans — and fish — alone? There is nothing “innovative” about cruelty to animals (“‘Innovative’ fish farm off Ewa Beach is proposed,” Star-Advertiser, Aug. 16).

In order to maximize profits, fish farmers cram as many fish as possible into the smallest space possible while putting eyesores off our coast. Because of the crowded conditions, many farmed fish suffer from diseases that can be passed on to their free- roaming cousins.

Fish belong in the ocean, not in crowded pens or on somebody’s plate. The United Nations has acknowledged that a global shift toward plant-based eating is imperative both for slowing climate change and eradicating global hunger. And with the explosion of vegan options in recent years, it’s never been easier to make the switch, especially in Hawaii.

People come to Hawaii for its natural beauty. Fish farming should be as welcome as oil drilling platforms.

Jason Baker

Diamond Head

High rises, population growth part of rail plan

Regarding the objections by neighborhood board members Annette Yamaguchi and Richard Oshiro to the proposed condo development in Waipahu (“Plan for low-income housing towers over Waipahu,” Star-Advertiser, Aug. 16): This is why they built the rail, so they could build high rises all the way to the Ewa Plain.

You didn’t see this coming? I sure did, back when Mufi Hannemann floated the idea; thank Hannemann for this fiasco. Now they have to figure out a way to pay for rail by having so many people here that you can’t move without it. And Oahu’s already too crowded.

Whiting Hyland

Kailua

Vacation rentals support highly paid workers

Richard Borreca said that reducing the number of tourists by closing hotels isn’t a good idea, because hotels, although not providing ideal, six-figure jobs, are major employers (“Illegal vacation rentals thrive as DPP deals with federal investigation, indictments,” Star-Advertiser, On Politics, Aug. 15). Hence, he continues to go after vacation rentals.

As a retiree, I do some light handyman work for a woman running a vacation rental. I know that Borreca’s got it wrong. She does pay a nice $50 per hour for cleaning and indeed does contribute to earnings that are quite possibly in the six figures: There’s the air-conditioner technician, plumber, electrician, pest control technicians.

Yes, ain’t it awful: our common locals bringing in some nice dough rather than just the billionaire owners of hotels like the Marriott and Hyatt?

Shame on you, Star-Advertiser.

Lewis Hitchcock

Waikiki

Political leadership, not military, failed Afghans

It’s always interesting to see the insurgents that we spend years trying to put down taking back their own country via American ingenuity.

A newspaper photograph showed Taliban fighters riding an American-made Humvee triumphantly into Kabul, just as TV reports continue to show American equipment (helicopters, vehicles) captured by the bad guys (“Collapse ends U.S. era in Afghanistan,” Star-Advertiser, Aug. 16).

This is a throwback to Saigon, where there were dozens of pictures of hundreds — if not thousands — of American military vehicles left behind, plus the infamous tossing of helicopters off the deck of an aircraft carrier (although the North Vietnamese and the Viet Cong rolled into Saigon (now Ho Chi Minh city) on Russian T-72 tanks).

We have the greatest military in the world. It is the political leadership vacuum in our country that causes these disasters, for as the saying goes, “He who does not understand history is bound to repeat it.”

Chip Davey

Downtown Honolulu

Could Afghanistan become a vacation spot?

We have all heard the expression, “History repeats itself.” If you look back to the early 1970s, we left South Vietnam, which was quickly taken over by the Communists from the North. It seems we have repeated this with Afghanistan.

Now, 50 years later, we are on friendly terms with Vietnam, and American tourists travel there.

Will the situation be the same with Afghanistan in the future?

Time will tell.

S. Rick Crump

Kaneohe

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