What you should know
- New York City is expanding its vaccine mandate to all public employees without a trial option, the mayor’s office announced Wednesday.
- City employees will receive $ 500 in their paychecks starting Wednesday if they receive their first injection at a city-run vaccination site.
- NYPD officers have had the option to get vaccinated or tested, but as of October 29, the 20,000 or more who have not yet received their dose must receive at least one or receive a non-dose license. salary, authorities said.
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NEW YORK – COVID-19 vaccines work, research shows. So do vaccine mandates. That’s why New York City officials are expanding the requirement to all public employees, with no probation option, the mayor’s office announced Wednesday.
Effective immediately, city employees will receive $ 500 in their paychecks if they receive their first injection at a city-run vaccination site, according to the mayor’s office.
The new rules affect more than 160,000 workers (including police, firefighters and correctional officers), 70% of whom already had at least one dose.
“There is no greater privilege than serving the people of New York City, and that privilege comes with the responsibility to keep you and your community safe,” Mayor Bill de Blasio said in making the announcement Wednesday.
“We have led the way against COVID-19, from fighting for the right to vaccinate frontline workers, to providing nation-leading incentives to create the Key to NYC mandate,” the Democrat continued. “As we continue our recovery for all of us, city workers have been a daily inspiration. Now is the time for them to show their city the way out of this pandemic once and for all.”
De Blasio said the city will immediately begin impact negotiations with the affected unions.
Under an executive order signed by the mayor last month, New York police officers must be vaccinated or show proof of a negative COVID-19 test each week, but the new order that is expected to become official later Wednesday means Some 20,000 unvaccinated officers must receive at least one dose by Oct. 29 or receive an unpaid leave of absence, authorities said. The deadline is 5pm that day.
The NYPD has about 34,500 uniformed personnel and about 17,700 people in non-uniformed support positions. It had a 61% vaccination rate last month, but that number jumped to 68% in less than two weeks, according to New York Police Commissioner Dermot Shea.
Rafael Pujols gives us the details.
The mandate goes into effect Dec. 1 for uniformed members of the Department of Corrections.
The two commissioners who oversee America’s largest police and fire departments have already said earlier this month that they support the mandate of the members of their respective departments. Shea had even made passionate pleas to officers in a video message, urging them to get vaccinated.
The new mandate comes shortly after the city reached a milestone of 85% residents with at least one dose of the vaccine.
The five counties were the first to enact one of the strictest vaccination mandates in the country, a radical measure that requires vaccinations for everyone entering a bar, restaurant, nail salon, gym, or sports game, to increase the overall percentage. of the population protected from COVID. 19.
Mayor De Blasio continues to encourage those who have not been vaccinated to do so. At the rate the city is going, he says, only about a million adult New Yorkers remain unvaccinated.
“At this point, there are only about a million adults left to vaccinate and they keep coming in. The incentives, the mandates, everything is working,” De Blasio said.
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