Demand to Fire Minnesota Health Commissioner by Legislators

In a letter from the entire Iron Range Delegation along with the Senator John Marty, DFL – Roseville, it was demanded from the governor Tim Pawlenty that Diane Mandernach, Minnesota Health Commissioner should be fired. This letter was written after a report of deliberate negligence of the health department was made public that stated the failure of the department to release mesothelioma cancer date in Iron Range asbestos cases.

People as well as legislators of the state of Minnesota are insistent that Diana Mandernach should be fired for deliberately hiding the data that was later revealed in a Minneapolis Star Tribute investigation; published a few weeks back. The paper reported that the department came to know about 35 additional mesothelioma cases among Iron Range miners in Minnesota in March 2006. This was almost double the number of miners who had already been diagnosed with mesothelioma cancer in 2003. However, these facts were not revealed and the people of the region were not informed about the grave danger they were exposed to in form of the taconite mines.

The Iron Range Legislators are very angry at deliberate hiding of these facts by the health department and say that the delay in the release of the cancer data is unacceptable. As stated by the legislators in their letter to Pawlenty, “We can think of no greater breach of the public trust, than for the Commissioner of Health to subvert, conceal, and fail to warn workers of grave health dangers.”

According to Tom Rukavina, DFL-Pike, if the health department had released this data on time, it could have saved hundreds of lives from getting affected by mesothelioma cancer. He believes that such kind of a blunder only deserves firing of health commissioner. He said that discovery of so many cases in a period of 3 years means that Minnesota will be having a large number of mesothelioma patients in future too.

However, Governor Tim Pawlenty is resisting these efforts by the legislators. Governor Pawlenty has acknowledged that the health commissioner Diane Mandernach indeed made a mistake. In his reply to the letter from legislators, he has admitted that the cases were not handled properly and the data should have been made [public. However, he says that termination is not the answer to the problem. He has promised to work with the department to take the right action and help people.

Related Articles:

• University Of Minnesota Probing the Causes for Increasing Number of Mesothelioma Cases in Iron Ranges Miners
• Apology from Minnesota Health Commissioner for Delay in the Release of Mesothelioma Data
• Public demanding Answers from Minnesota Health Department for Negligence