Category: Covid-19 Vaccine

In late July, a federal judge upheld Indiana Universitys COVID-19 vaccine mandate for all students, faculty and staff, save for medical and religious exemptions. In the court opinion, Judge Damon R. Leichty emphasized the safety and efficacy of COVID-19 vaccines and affirmed IUs legal authority as a public university to mandate them.

Progress has been made because of the vaccine, not despite it, Leichty wrote. To the extent that lingering medical and scientific debate remain on this record, the court remains resolved that Indiana University has acted reasonably here in pursuing public health and safety for its campus communities.

So what is Purdue waiting for?

Make no mistakes. We are nowhere near the end of this pandemic. Cases and hospitalization are again sharply on the rise thanks to the far more contagious delta variant raging among the unvaccinated. State and local officials around the country rushed to restore indoor mask mandates as a result. According to the Indiana State Department of Health, only 49% of the Tippecanoe County residents are fully vaccinated. Meanwhile, Purdues vaccination rate continues to lag behind its Big Ten counterparts, especially those that mandated the vaccine. Protect Purdues latest update says 75% of all students, faculty and staff have submitted proof of vaccination, compared with University of Marylands 92.3% and Rutgers Universitys projected 100%. Both Purdues and the countys vaccination rate fall below the numbers estimated to achieve herd immunity.

A recent Yale study found that a college campus can resume full operation with minimal social distancing and testing requirements if 90 percent of the population is vaccinated. One of the authors, Dr. A. David Paltiel, went so far as to tell the New York Times that not requiring the vaccine amounts to a dereliction of duty: It really comes down to whether they have any business opening their doors.

As of Boiler Gold Rush week, Purdues COVID-19 policy remains a mishmash of mask mandate and differing testing and quarantine protocols based on vaccination status. Instead of mandating the vaccine and reallocating vital resources from a weekly testing system the elimination of routine testing is projected to save IU more than $10 million Purdue opted for publicity stunts. The Old Golden Ticket Drawing was announced during summer, where 10 students who submitted proof of vaccination are drawn at random to receive $9,992 and a similar program created for faculty and staff. Unfortunately for Purdue, the nonstop media blitz promoting the event with flashy, reality TV show-like video clips does not change the unpleasant truth: a negligible chance at a lottery is not going to change anybodys mind.

But regardless of how important the vaccine is in ending our collective misery, Purdue appears to believe it doesnt have an obligation to make sure the shots go into as many arms and as quickly as possible. Time and again university officials characterize getting a vaccine as a personal choice, seemingly ignoring the fact that Purdue mandated the flu shot last year as part of its pandemic response in addition to half a dozen decade-old state immunization requirements. We now have a minimal chance of catching measles, mumps or rubella not because of daily health precautions or routine testing, but because vaccine mandates from public institutions like Purdue made mass inoculation possible.

It seems ironic that Purdue recently adopted its first-ever civics literacy graduation requirement, which supposedly graduates informed and responsible citizens, but then abandoned its own civic duties with inaction in the middle of a pandemic. University officials and experts who mandated civics knowledge cannot possibly believe that they dont have the responsibility or power to mandate a vaccine, or that students dont have a civic responsibility to protect themselves and others. Responsibility is not a choice; one cannot pick and choose which responsibility to fulfill based on personal choice.

In times of unprecedented crisis, it is of the utmost importance and urgency for the administration to take action. Purdue has demonstrated beyond a shadow of doubt that it has the will and resources to require a vaccine on the fly and ensure student compliance with the flu shot mandate last year. The question now is whether university officials have that Purdue grit they have long been advocating for to not put the fear of political backlash or wrath of big donors above the well-being of this community. If Mitch Daniels is sincere about doing everything he can to get Purdue through this pandemic, then he should do the obvious: joining forces with over 500 colleges and universities to mandate the COVID-19 vaccine.

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OPINION: Purdue, do the right thing and mandate the COVID-19 vaccine - Purdue Exponent

As vaccinations in the U.S. have slowed significantly from their peak, they have risen sharply in Latin America, with a host of countries now inoculating against Covid-19 at a far higher rate than their richer neighbor to the north.

The progress in Latin America is built on two factors that have gotten little attention: In many countries, people are eager to get vaccinated and largely trust vaccines, more so than in many richer countries, including the U.S.

At the same time, vaccine supply problems are being slowly overcome. Far greater numbers of vaccines are now arriving from the U.S., U.K., Russia and China, allowing local health officials to pick up the pace.

Latin America has always been a champion for vaccination and people trust vaccines, said Patricia Garca, a former Peruvian health minister and epidemiologist. If we are able to get enough supply of the vaccines, we can catch up.

Roughly two-thirds of people in Chile and Uruguay are fully vaccinated, compared with about half in the U.S. Most of the rest of Latin America is still behind the U.S. in the share of people with one or both vaccine doses, but a number of countries are closing the gap fast.

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In Covid-19 Vaccination Push, Latin American Nations Are Catching Up to the U.S. - The Wall Street Journal

MINNEAPOLIS (WCCO) Organizers of the Basilica Block Party announced that the two-day music festival slated for September will require proof of COVID-19 vaccination or a negative COVID-19 test.

On Friday, organizers said that they are implementing the new entry protocols for the health and safety of our Basilica Block Party and greater Twin Cities community.

RELATED: Dozens Of Minnesota State Fair Vendors, Exhibitors Wont Return This Year

Full COVID-19 vaccination or a negative test taken within 72 hour of the event are required for all those who attend.

Please bring a photo ID plus either proof of vaccination or a negative test result for event entry. Our goal is to provide a safe and fun event for everyone, the announcement said.

Face masks are not required, but will be strongly encouraged. There will also be hand sanitizing stations throughout the event site.

Refunds are available, but must be requested by Monday, Aug. 31.

The block party will be held at the Basilica of Saint Mary near downtown Minneapolis on Sept. 10 and Sept. 11.

RELATED: Basilica Block Party Returning In September: Lineup Features Motion City Soundtrack, Avett Brothers, Tate McRae And More

The main stage will feature artists like AJR, Tate McRae, The Avett Brothers, Spoon and more. Motion City Soundtrack and the Black Pumas will be some of the top acts for the west lawn stage, and the Star Tribune stage will feature artists like Koo Koo Kanga Roo and Diane (FKA D Mills).

Minneapolis entertainment venues, First Avenue and The Ordway, previously announced requirements of vaccination proof or a negative COVID-19 test.

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Basilica Block Party To Require Proof Of Full COVID-19 Vaccination Or Negative Test - CBS Minnesota

Ashley A. had not planned on getting vaccinated against COVID-19. She said she was terrified of needles, and concerned about the pace at which the vaccines had been developed and authorized for emergency use. Her friends and family shared conspiracy theories about the vaccines and were vocal about their distrust in the science behind the shots. Shed wanted to wait and see how others reacted to their shots before deciding whether to get it.

At first I was like, I'm not doing it, you know, I don't want to be the guinea pig, she told BuzzFeed News.

As a medical officer at a prison in California, Ashley A. (who asked to omit her last name so she could speak freely) had access to weekly COVID-19 tests. Her workplace also started offering the vaccines to staff in December, but she kept declining.

And then, in July, an earth-shattering event changed her mind: A close friend who Ashley A. considered a sister was hospitalized with COVID-19 and died.

She was doing OK and then she wasn't. She was scared and alone and it broke me, Ashley A. said.

Knowing a lot of people in her life would not get vaccinated, she decided she would overcome her anxieties and get the shot to protect them, believing that it would make her less likely to transmit the virus. I dont want to be a danger to them, she said. I dont want to lose someone like that again, I cant go through that.

One week after her friends funeral, Ashley A. received the single-shot Johnson & Johnson vaccine.

Ashley A. was one of more than 430 people who responded to BuzzFeed News callout to readers who were vaccinated against COVID-19 in the summer. We set out to discover why some people waited months after the shots became widely accessible to the public before getting it.

After fulfilling massive demand in the first few months of the year, vaccination rates began plummeting by mid-April. Officials offered everything from free entry to city attractions to $1 million lotteries to encourage people to get the vaccine. And for a few weeks in the early summer, it almost felt like life was returning to a prepandemic state in many parts of the country. Concerts came back. Stores reopened. People went out with little fear, and, after the CDCs announcement that vaccinated people did not have to wear masks in most situations an announcement that shocked some public health experts without masks.

Then the Delta wave hit. The country is now going through yet another dj vu moment: Case counts are spiking, hospitalizations are soaring, and daily case records are being broken. Since younger people in the US are less likely to be vaccinated, theyre now making up a bigger share of those falling sick and dying of COVID-19.

Vaccination rates have slowly climbed in the last month, as city and state governments began mandating COVID-19 vaccines for some indoor activities and certain professions. But the increase is not happening fast enough to blunt the current COVID-19 wave.

Nothing is going to get better until we increase our vaccination rates, Monica Gandhi, an infectious disease specialist at the University of California San Francisco, told BuzzFeed News.

In late July, the CDC reversed its mask guidance for vaccinated people. The unvaccinated, by choice, are a threat to public health at this point, Amesh Adalja of the Johns Hopkins Bloomberg School of Public Health told BuzzFeed News at the time.

Most people who responded to our callout were not virulent anti-vaxxers. Some faced barriers that were systemic, like not being offered time off from work to recover from their shot. Others had concerns rooted in the countrys history of racism in the medical system. A number of pregnant people had been worried about whether the vaccine would affect their babies. (While the CDC issued new guidance last week strongly recommending that pregnant and breastfeeding people get their shots because of their increased risk of complications from COVID-19, only around 22% of pregnant people have gotten at least one dose of the vaccine.)

Many simply wanted to see how the vaccines impacted people around them before getting it themselves, including Jourdana, who lives on the East Coast. Ultimately, I am a wait and seer, said Jourdana. She got vaccinated in late July after seeing her vaccinated friends and colleagues experience no unexpected side effects.

But this strategy has had deadly consequences for some. A 39-year-old man in Las Vegas who wanted to wait a year before getting the vaccine died of COVID-19 in late July, after texting his fianc, I should have gotten the damn vaccine, Fox 5 reported. And according to local reports, several hospitalized COVID-19 patients told their loved ones that they wanted to get the vaccine before they ultimately died.

Morgan, a 30-year-old in San Diego who got vaccinated in early July, craved the freedom that their vaccinated loved ones had a feeling many respondents shared.

Life is moving on, Morgan said. I was beginning to feel left out and also fearful that they would carry the infection and it would infect me.

Many also said they got their vaccines as they felt their circles dividing into vaccinated and unvaccinated camps and were uncomfortable about being among the latter.

One of the reasons Joe, a 27-year-old from New York, got the vaccine in July was because establishments were enforcing different rules for the vaccinated and the nonvaccinated. It got to the point where I felt a bit embarrassed when my colleagues or other people mentioned whether I was vaccinated or not, Joe said.

Becky Rooney also felt similarly at work one day in June when her employer announced that vaccinated staff did not need to wear their masks, following the CDCs guidance. Everyone around her ripped their mask off and cheered, she told BuzzFeed News, and she felt awkward and singled out.

A dancer who was contracted at a theme park at the time, Rooney thought the vaccines were developed too quickly and wanted to wait for full FDA approval before getting her jab. (Three of the vaccines available in the US have received emergency authorization. To grant full approval, the agency must review much more data and conduct inspections on manufacturing facilities. Anthony Fauci said in early August that he was hopeful it would come by the end of the month.)

The COVID-19 vaccines were developed at a remarkable pace, backed by upwards of $18 billion in funding from the Trump administrations Operation Warp Speed and an unprecedented urgency brought on by a global pandemic. Scientists have also researched mRNA vaccines for decades.

But for Rooney, being the one of the few at work who wasnt vaccinated made her feel like an oddity.

I just felt like there was a huge spotlight on me and that I just felt kind of judged, she said. That was one of the deciding factors that was making me like, All right, maybe it's time for me to go out and get vaccinated.

Two days later, on a whim, Rooney pulled up to a Rite Aid and got the Johnson & Johnson shot. Still, she felt like she was pressured into getting vaccinated before she was fully ready to do so.

I was like, I just wanna get this over and done with. I don't want to think about it anymore, I don't want to feel judged, I don't want to feel embarrassed, she said.

For dozens of respondents, it was the threat posed by the highly contagious Delta variant that did it for them.

Unvaccinated people make up most of the new COVID-19 cases and an overwhelming majority of severe cases that lead to hospitalization or death. The vaccines provide significant protection against the disease, including against the new variants; the CDCs data has shown that more than 99.999% of fully vaccinated people have not died or been hospitalized due to COVID-19.

A CDC study in late July that looked at a COVID-19 outbreak in Provincetown, Massachusetts, suggested that vaccinated people who get infected with the highly contagious Delta variant, though overwhelmingly protected from severe illness, can carry a similar amount of virus as unvaccinated people. In other words, because of Delta, some vaccinated people may be able to infect others too. Some public health experts have cautioned that circumstances around the outbreak which involved exceedingly crowded bars, restaurants, and other indoor and outdoor venues are not necessarily representative of the daily activities of a vaccinated person.

This happened in an outbreak setting where people were very closely contacting other people. If you are in tightly packed indoor venues getting exposed for hours, just having a vaccine alone is not going to protect you from getting infected, David Dowdy, an infectious disease epidemiologist at Johns Hopkins Bloomberg School of Public Health, told BuzzFeed News. What the vaccine does is it gives your immune system a head start, if you will, in fighting this virus.

Jenny, a 39-year-old from Arizona, said she too was waiting for full FDA approval before getting the vaccine. But she decided to get vaccinated in July. As Jenny wrote, This Delta variant is scary as hell.

Some were motivated by upcoming trips overseas and the expectation of vaccination requirements.

A number of people also said they finally got their shots because of vaccination mandates by colleges and employers, where community safety is paramount.

The more people you have who are not immune, the more people you have who are able to maintain transmission within communities, Dowdy said, adding that getting vaccinated is the "easiest, safest way" to build immunity.

Our personal choices do not just affect us, they affect those around us as well whether we want them to or not, Dowdy added. And this is obviously especially true for an infectious disease.

Ashley, an 18-year-old from Hillsdale, Michigan, said her colleges vaccine requirement was the tipping point for her mom to come around on allowing her to get vaccinated. After doing her own research, Ashley said she wanted the vaccine but, because she was 17 at the time, she required her moms permission to do so.

Her mom was hesitant, she said, until her school, Elmhurst University, announced that all students had to be fully vaccinated to return to campus. Ashley said she was relieved to not have another difficult conversation with her mom about the vaccines.

My mom relented when my college released its statement, she said.

For many people, however, it wasnt just one thing that made them change their minds. For those like Jessica Mireles, a stay-at-home mom of four in Houston, it was a combination of several factors that inched them across the line.

Mireles had seen firsthand what a bad case of COVID-19 looks like her mom came down with the virus in December. She struggled to breathe and was in a lot of pain, Mireles said. When I would call her on the phone she sounded like she was running on a treadmill. She was like, [gasping sounds], breathing so fast and so hard that you could barely understand her, she told BuzzFeed News.

Her mom eventually recovered, but the weeks Mireles spent worrying that she could lose her were terrifying, she said. When the vaccines became available to them in Texas, her parents immediately signed up for it.

Mireles shot down her moms repeated pleas for her to get vaccinated over the next few months. She was afraid of the long-term effects of the vaccines and worried the development process was rushed. But when her husband went back to work in an office and decided to get vaccinated in March, she watched as he stopped wearing his mask, went out to meet clients, and visited restaurants and stores. Mireles felt a pang when she saw her husband going about with a sense of freedom that she did not have.

One day in July, as the Delta variant raged across the country and particularly in Houston, where there was a massive outbreak at the time Mireles was visiting her parents home when she caught a doctor being interviewed on cable news about rising case counts and hospitalizations. He said, if you're not vaccinated yet, you probably have about two weeks until you catch the Delta variant, Mireles recalled.

That was the final straw. The very next day, she got her first dose of the Moderna vaccine.

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These People Got Vaccinated Against COVID-19 After Holding Out For Months. They Told Us Why. - BuzzFeed News

VATICAN CITY, Aug 18 (Reuters) - Pope Francis issued an appeal on Wednesday urging people to get inoculated against COVID-19, saying the vaccines could bring an end to the pandemic, but needed to be taken by everyone.

"Thanks to God's grace and to the work of many, we now have vaccines to protect us from COVID-19," the pope said in a video message made on behalf of the nonprofit U.S. group the Ad Council and the public health coalition COVID Collaborative.

"They grant us the hope of ending the pandemic, but only if they are available to all and if we work together."

Vaccines are widely available in mainly wealthier nations, but mistrust and hesitancy over the newly developed shots have meant that many people are refusing to take them, leaving them especially vulnerable as the Delta variant spreads.

By contrast, poorer nations still do not have access to large-scale vaccine supplies.

Pope Francis holds the weekly general audience at the Paul VI Audience Hall at the Vatican, August 11, 2021. REUTERS/Guglielmo Mangiapane/File Photo

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Medical experts have warned that ever-more dangerous variants might develop if the virus is allowed to circulate in large pools of non-vaccinated people.

Pope Francis was himself vaccinated in March, saying at the time that it was an ethical obligation.

"Vaccination is a simple but profound way of promoting the common good and caring for each other, especially the most vulnerable. I pray to God that everyone may contribute their own small grain of sand, their own small gesture of love," the pope said in his latest video message.

The Ad Council and COVID Collaborative launched vaccine public service announcements to the U.S. public in January across television, websites and social media.

In a statement, the Ad Council said the pope's message represented its first campaign designed for a global audience.

Reporting by Crispian BalmerEditing by Marguerita Choy

Our Standards: The Thomson Reuters Trust Principles.

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Pope Francis urges everyone to get COVID-19 vaccines for the good of all - Reuters

A new study published in the journal Health Affairs estimates that by the second week of May 2021, the early COVID-19 vaccination campaign in the United States had prevented almost 140,000 deaths.

In addition, it may have prevented nearly 3 million cases of the disease.

While it had been expected that the vaccines would slow transmission of the virus and save lives, it was not certain just how much their rapid deployment would affect death rates.

This study aimed to assess the association between state-level vaccination rates and COVID-19 deaths during the first 5 months that the vaccines were available.

To study the link between vaccination rates and COVID-19 deaths, a group of researchers from RAND and Indiana University created models to estimate how many deaths would have occurred without vaccinations.

Sumedha Gupta, the first author of the study and an economist at Indiana University-Purdue University Indianapolis, said she and her team estimated the COVID-19 illnesses and deaths reductions by conducting a natural experiment.

States with high vaccination rates were the treatment group, while states with low vaccination rates were the control group.

Data from the Bloomberg COVID-19 Vaccine Tracker was used to determine how many vaccine doses had been given in each state.

Death data came from The New York Times Coronavirus (COVID-19) Data in the United States database.

The study included the time period of Dec. 21, 2020, to May 9, 2021. As of May 9, researchers found that COVID-19 vaccination had prevented 139,393 deaths.

Gupta said they also found that the associated deaths varied quite a bit from state to state.

For example, in New York, vaccinations led to an estimated 11.7 fewer COVID-19 deaths per 10,000 people.

In Hawaii, however, the reduction was only an estimated 1.1 fewer deaths per 10,000 people.

On average, states experienced a reduction of 5 deaths per 10,000 people. There was also variation in how quickly each state progressed in getting people vaccinated.

Alaska was the leader, reaching 20 doses per 100 adults on Jan. 29. Alabama was last to reach this milestone, not getting there until Feb. 21.

California was the first state to reach 120 doses per 100 adults, but many states have not passed this mark.

Gupta said the economic value of the lives saved during the study period amounts to between $625 billion and $1.4 trillion.

Dr. Tyler Evans, the co-founder of Wellness & Equity Alliance, who was not associated with the study, noted that there were several limitations in the study, such as variability between communities and the fact that natural immunity was not factored in.

However, Evans said vaccines definitely prevent hospitalizations and save lives, even against the Delta variant.

Thus far, vaccinations remain the most reliable means to check the pandemic, said Gupta. Yet, vaccination rates have significantly reduced, even in states where a large share of the population remains unvaccinated.

Gupta said there are real concerns about low vaccination rates since they are at continued risk for COVID-19 surges and variants.

She noted that it is of paramount importance for scientists to get the word out about how state vaccination drives have benefited the population to bring the pandemic under control.

Evans seconded this idea, saying that state vaccine programs that are more aggressive save lives and money.

Just how many remains to be seen, added Evans, but studies like Gupta et al. should continue to explore these avenues and help scientists, medical practitioners, and the general public to better understand the role of vaccinations in not only preventing illness and hospitalization but in helping to slow down the spread of the virus once and for all.

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COVID-19 Vaccines Saved 140,000 Lives Over First 5 Months of 2021 - Healthline

GADSDEN, Ala. (WIAT) As Alabama hospitals fill up, cities are racing to get neighbors vaccinated. In one east Alabama city, efforts seem to be paying off, literally.

Dozens of Gadsden neighbors received $100 payments for getting fully vaccinated as part of an incentive program that was announced last month. Under Vaccinate Gadsden, residents who live in city limits are eligible for the money if they prove they were fully vaccinated after the initiative was launched July 19.

So far, about 600 vouchers have been requested, which means those people have received at least one of the mRNA vaccine doses or the Johnson & Johnson vaccine, according to Etowah County Emergency Management director Deborah Gaither.

Gaither said the situation has become dire in Etowah County, much like other areas across the state. Both area hospitals are diverting patients because facilities are so full.

We do not have any critical care beds at this time in Etowah County and it is not just our hospitals. our paramedics are tired and wary too getting multiple calls per day, Gaither said.

This time last month, the vaccination rate for Etowah County was between 32 and 33%. Now, that rate has gone up about 5%.

Gaither hopes the Vaccinate Gadsden program will increase the vaccination rate.

Neighbors who received the incentive payments said that the incentive was only part of the motivation.Shaun Huff and his father both received the payments.

My mother has like multiple sclerosis so she has a weak immune system so she got vaccinated about like two months ago but it took him a little bit longer to get vaccinated because he was iffy about it, but once the delta variant came along that is kind of why he got vaccinated because its gotten a little bit worse over the past few months, Huff said.

Some participants told CBS 42 they got the vaccine because of requirements from an employer. Others were concerned about travel.

I was going out of town and I just did not want to go unvaccinated because I knew about the people in my town, but I was going out of town and I did not know how they were so I went on and got vaccinated and the $100 just came with it, I was glad of that, said Veronia Westbrooks, a resident who received the vaccine through the program.

According to a city of Gadsden spokesperson, between 55 and 60 people received payments Wednesday on the first day the money was offered.

Moving forward, residents can collect the cash on Wednesdays and Fridays on the second floor of Gadsden City Hall between 11 a.m. and 4 p.m.

Individuals must bring proof of residency, vaccine records, and a completed voucher that can be obtained from participating pharmacies.

Residents have until Oct. 15. People who were vaccinated before the launch of the program are not eligible for the payments.

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Dozens of Gadsden residents receive $100 payments after getting COVID-19 vaccine - WIAT - CBS42.com

OLYMPIA All employees in K-12 schools, most child care and early learning centers, and higher education must get vaccinated for COVID-19 by Oct. 18 or they may lose their jobs, Gov. Jay Inslee announced Wednesday.

All K-12 educators, school staff, substitutes coaches, bus drivers, school volunteers and others working in school facilities must get vaccinated as a condition of employment. The requirement includes public, private and charter schools.

There will be no option for regular COVID-19 tests instead of vaccination. With few exemptions, Washingtons vaccine requirement for teachers is among the strictest in the nation, according to the New York Times.

We can go back to the painful days of closing businesses and schools, or we can use the known, effective and safe tools at our disposal to keep our businesses and schools open, Inslee told reporters Wednesday. We should not shut down our schools again.

Those two tools: masks and vaccines.

Inslee also announced that everyone, regardless of vaccination status, is required to wear masks inside public settings.

Inslees announcements on Wednesday were not met without opposition.

About 75 protesters gathered on the steps of the Legislative Building in Olympia with signs that said unmask our kids and let kids breathe. Students, teachers and staff are required to wear masks while inside K-12 spaces this school year.

During Inslees news conference, protesters found their way inside, chanting We will not consent! and banging on the door of Inslees office.

Inslee and Superintendent of Public Instruction Chris Reykdal made clear Wednesday the vaccine requirement does not apply to students.

The requirement follows rapidly increasing COVID-19 cases and hospitalizations across the state, Inslee said. The delta variant presents a new challenge to the state.

In a sense, this is a new fight, he said.

Secretary of Health Dr. Umair Shah said about 98% of COVID-19 cases in the state are due to the delta variant, calling it a very serious situation.

Still, most cases are occurring in unvaccinated people, Inslee said. About 95% of hospitalizations in the state are for those who are not vaccinated.

Last week, Reykdal sent a letter to Inslee, urging him to include public school employees in the governors vaccine mandate for state and health care employees.

He said Friday he was confident Inslee would follow through with his request.

Reykdal said without vaccine mandates and mask mandates, keeping schools open will be a challenge.

He has said he would withhold federal funding to schools this year if they do not follow the Office of the Superintendent of Public Instructions guidelines, which include offering full-time, in-person instruction and requiring masks for everyone indoors.

(The vaccine mandate) is a requirement, Reykdal said Wednesday. We will expect folks to move expeditiously who do not have this.

There will still be exemptions for employees who need medical or religious accommodations, similar to what state and health care employees have.

Unions may bargain for time off to receive the vaccine or recover from symptoms, according to Inslees office.

Employees in Washingtons higher education institutions and most child care and early learning providers are also required to be fully vaccinated by Oct. 18. In higher education, that includes staff, faculty and contractors. Coaches and coaching staff are also included under this mandate.

For child care and early learning, it includes licensed, certified and contracted programs, license-exempt programs and contractors. Family, friends and neighbor caregivers are not included in the mandate.

Those who refuse to get vaccinated will be subject to dismissal, according to his office.

To meet the Oct. 18 deadline of fully vaccinated, employees need to complete their second dose by Oct. 4. Fully vaccinated means two weeks after the second dose of Pfizer or Moderna, or after the dose of Johnson & Johnson.

The mandate is from the state agencies, but local school districts will be the ones charged with checking vaccination status, Reykdal said.

Schools will begin regular checks of vaccination status among their employees, and by Oct. 5, they will know who has not been vaccinated.

Those who have not received their second dose by that point will likely lose their jobs, Inslee said.

The dismissal process statewide will take days, not months, Inslee said.

The governors office estimates the requirement will cover about 155,000 educators and staff in K-12 schools across the state. It will likely affect about 118,000 workers in child care and early learning programs, and 90,000 for higher education. Those numbers are everyone it covers, regardless of vaccination status.

Reykdal said the percent of employees already vaccinated varies geographically and by what type of job they do. In many places, the percentage is well in excess of 70%, but in other places, it is much less.

Our goal is to get them all vaccinated, he said.

Inslee said he does not think many people will end up losing their jobs because these are folks that care about the public.

The National Education Association last week announced its support for requiring all educators to receive a COVID-19 vaccine.

Inslee said this decision comes as there is a growing acceptance by the public for vaccine and mask mandates, but acknowledged there will still be some people who do not agree.

Inslee and Reykdal encouraged protesters to keep their anger toward the state, not toward the local school districts.

They need to run schools, Reykdal said. That criticism can come our way.

School districts dont have the authority to make or change these requirements, Inslee said.

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Inslee: Teachers and staff must receive COVID-19 vaccine by mid-October - The Spokesman-Review

Hospitalization rates in those bottom 10 states are nearly four times higher, and death rates are more than 5.5 times higher than in the top 10 states, according to a CNN analysis of federal data.

Nearly 93% of the US population lives in an area with high Covid-19 transmission, according to the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention.

"We continue to see a rise in cases driven by the more transmissible Delta variant with cases concentrated in communities with lower vaccination rates," Jeff Zients, White House coronavirus response coordinator, said Wednesday at a virtual Covid-19 briefing. "So this remains a pandemic of the unvaccinated."

The 10 states with the lowest vaccination rates are Alabama, Mississippi, Wyoming, Idaho, Louisiana, Arkansas, West Virginia, Georgia, Tennessee and North Dakota. Data from the US Department of Health and Human Services shows an average of 39 people hospitalized with Covid-19 for every 100,000 residents in those states, compared to 10 for every 100,000 in the top 10 vaccinated states.

The top states with high vaccination rates are Vermont, Massachusetts, Maine, Connecticut, Rhode Island, Maryland, New Jersey, New Hampshire, Washington and New York.

In the 10 states with the lowest vaccination rates, there is an average of about 34 deaths per 1 million residents, and in states with the highest, the average is six deaths per 1 million, according to data from Johns Hopkins University.

CDC Director Dr. Rochelle Wallensky said at the news conference that the country is averaging about 500 Covid-19 deaths a day -- deaths that "remain largely preventable."

"In areas with low vaccination coverage, we continue to hear far too many heartbreaking stories of people who did not get vaccinated, only then to get severe Covid-19," she said. "In these areas, the data are showing us that the more people who are in the hospital, and tragically, more people are dying of Covid-19."

Child Covid-19 cases are steadily increasing as schools reopen

As Covid-19 cases and hospitalizations surge in the US, a health expert is warning that an accompanying rise in cases among children, many of whom aren't yet eligible to be vaccinated, will only worsen as schools resume classes.

Hotez said the US is now at a "screaming level of virus transmission," adding that to really interrupt the spread, 80 to 85% of the population will need to be vaccinated.

Boosters planned for adult mRNA vaccine recipients

That plan still depends on whether the US Food and Drug Administration authorizes boosters and whether the CDC's immunization advisory committee recommends those boosters, US Surgeon General Dr. Vivek Murthy said.

Under the plan, adult mRNA vaccine recipients would be eligible for a booster eight months after receiving their second dose, starting the week of September 20, Murthy said during the White House Covid-19 news conference.

The plan to authorize an mRNA booster comes as data suggests that protection against mild and moderate disease from the first two doses appears to decline over time, Murthy said.

He emphasized coronavirus vaccines still appear to be effective in protecting against severe Covid-19, hospitalization and death.

But, "we are concerned that this pattern of decline we are seeing (in protections against mild and moderate disease) will continue in the months ahead, which could lead to reduced protection against severe disease, hospitalization and death," Murthy said.

As the Delta variant increased its grip in the US this summer, coronavirus cases, hospitalizations and deaths have jumped.

The US averaged more than 137,500 new daily cases over the past week -- an average that is more than 11 times higher than it was two months ago, when the figure was nearing its lowest point of the year, according to Johns Hopkins University.

More than 88,300 Covid-19 patients were in US hospitals Tuesday, nearly five times higher than two months ago, according to the Department of Health and Human Services. And the US averaged 734 Covid-19 deaths a day over the past week, more than double the average seen two months ago, according to Johns Hopkins.

Thousands of students already quarantining

Many schools that have gone back to campus are already seeing the impact of the spread of the virus.

More than 3,000 students and employees have been quarantined in the New Orleans Public School District because of Covid-19 cases in the past week, according to the district's latest tally.

They represent 5.89% of the students and teachers in the district.

Students returned to the New Orleans Public School District on August 12 and are required to wear masks in school facilities, according to the district.

Among the state's 15 largest school districts, at least 4,641 students and 1,547 employees have tested positive for coronavirus and at least another 19,072 students and staff members have been quarantined or isolated because of Covid-19.

The tallies do not include any cases from the two biggest school districts in Florida -- Miami-Dade and Broward. Miami-Dade begins classes August 23. Broward started Wednesday.

On Tuesday, Florida's State Board of Education voted unanimously to recommend investigations into the Broward and Alachua districts over their requirements for mask-wearing in school.

In Arizona, Gov. Doug Ducey said the state would use federal Covid relief money to increase the funding available to public school districts only if they're open for in-person learning and don't require children to wear masks.

In Washington, Gov. Jay Inslee announced a policy that requires everyone who works at an academic institution in the state to be vaccinated by October 18.

"We won't gamble with the health of our children, our educators and school staff, nor the health of the communities they serve," Inslee said.

CNN's Melissa Alonso, Lauren Mascarenhas, Deidre McPhillips, Rebekah Riess, Andy Rose, Mallory Simon, and Elizabeth Stuart contributed to this report.

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If you live in a state with a low vaccination rate, you're 4 times more likely to be hospitalized and more than 5 times more likely to die - CNN

President Biden criticized governors who are "trying to block and intimidate local school officials and educators" over the use of masks in schools, calling the actions "wrong" and "unacceptable."

Biden announced that he is directing Education Secretary Miguel Cardona to use "all of hisoversight authorities and legalaction, if appropriate, againstgovernors who are trying toblock and intimidate localschool officials and educators," as they attempt to combat the spread of Covid-19.

Biden continued, "If you aren'tgoing to fight Covid-19, atleast get out of the way ofeveryone else who's trying.You know, we're not going to sitby as governors try to block andintimidate educators protectingour children."

Biden said that if a governor is threatening to withhold pay from an educator, federal resources from the American Rescue Plan can be used to pay the salary, "100%."

"The CDC, saysmasks are critical, especiallyfor those who are not yetvaccinated like our childrenunder the age of 12.So let's put politics aside.Let's follow the educators andthe scientists, who know a lotmore about how to teach ourchildren and keep them safe thanany politician. This administration is alwaysgoing to take the side of ourchildren," the President said.

The comments were Bidens latest against governors Ron DeSantis of Florida and Greg Abbott of Texas who have blocked mask mandates, although he did not do so by name.

Biden thanked officials who were standing up to their state and local officials and said he was not going to sit by as Governors try to block and intimidate educators protecting our children.

CNN's Allie Malloy contributed reporting to this post.

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Covid-19 booster shots to be offered in the US: Live updates - CNN