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New York, U.S. | Xinhua | Most U.S. cities and states have been strenuously pushing through the vaccine mandate advocated by the federal government in efforts to contain the 19-month-long COVID-19 pandemic, though sectoral resistence still persists for various reasons, which deprives the battle of much-needed coherence and unison and drags the country’s feet on its way back to normal.
Global deaths from COVID-19 surpassed 5 million early Monday morning, according to the data from Johns Hopkins University’s coronavirus tracker. The United States led the world in the number of confirmed deaths from the virus with more than 746,000 people dead from COVID-19. Meanwhile, fully vaccinated Americans climbed to 192,453,500 as of Monday, making up 58 percent of the total population of the country.
HESITANCY IN NYC
Enforcement began on Monday for all New York City (NYC) municipal workers, including police and firefighters who are required to be vaccinated against COVID-19. Mayor Bill de Blasio tweeted that 91 percent of the city’s workforce had received at least one shot, including 22,472 new vaccinations since the mandate was announced on Oct. 20, and 3,564 since the deadline at 5:00 p.m. Friday.
However, roughly 6 percent of the total workforce, about 9,000 municipal workers, are now on unpaid leave, having failed to be vaccinated by the deadline, according to Press Secretary Danielle Filson. The mayor also said, “I want to thank everyone who got vaccinated. I know there were some questions and concerns. Thank you for getting vaccinated, for doing the right thing, for moving us forward.”
The fire department said that 18 fire companies are out of service, but no firehouses are closed. It is hard to say how many fire companies are currently understaffed, because it “changes by the minute.” The police department said that just 74 city police members are on unpaid leave because of the vaccine mandate, while 6,500 officers have applied for exemptions and can stay on the job if they continue weekly testing.
Fox News reported that thousands of NYC police officers, firefighters and other municipal workers have been placed on unpaid leave on Monday for failing to comply with the mayor’s coronavirus vaccine mandate. As of Sunday night, 22,800 municipal workers remained unvaccinated, and “9,000 people (were) placed on leave without pay” on Monday, according to data released by the mayor’s office.
Under the city mandate, those who haven’t received at least one dose of the vaccine would be put on unpaid leave starting Monday, raising the possibility of shortages of police, fire and Express Mail Service workers. NYC has more than 300,000 employees. CNN said on Monday that “with a number of public safety employees pushing back against the mandate, officials had scrambled to deal with potential staff shortages.”
SHOWDOWN IN MAINE
On Friday, the U.S. Supreme Court allowed a vaccine mandate for Maine health care workers to remain in effect, rejecting an emergency request from workers who argued that they should receive religious exemptions. The brief order was a rare instance of the court deferring to a state’s COVID-19 policy in the face of religious-rights claims, and “the decision split the court’s conservative members,” local media reported.
The three most conservative justices — Clarence Thomas, Samuel Alito, and Neil Gorsuch — argued in dissent that Maine’s mandate unconstitutionally discriminates against health care workers with religious objections to the coronavirus vaccines. “There, healthcare workers who have served on the front line of a pandemic for the last 18 months are now being fired and their practices shuttered,” said their dissent.
Two other conservatives — Justices Brett Kavanaugh and Amy Coney Barrett — agreed with the decision not to intervene, saying the court’s emergency docket is not the right place to resolve the merits of the workers’ claims. The court has “discretionary judgment” on whether to take emergency appeals like this and claimed the court was being asked to “grant extraordinary relief,” they said in a statement.
The Supreme Court’s decision on Friday “was an important victory for efforts to control the pandemic through vaccination. But it is not a final one,” reported The New York Times, adding that almost all U.S. states do grant religious exemptions to their school vaccination mandates, but the fact that they’re not required to do so means they can repeal those exemptions if vaccination rates fall and outbreaks occur.
“Whether or not the court intended to unsettle the constitutionality of vaccine mandates, it has done so. A ruling requiring religious exemptions for vaccine mandates will create more uncertainty and encourage people to demand a religious exemption to any health law they do not like. The choice to invite that future belongs to the justices, but the consequences will be ours,” said the report.
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Xinhua
