The Case for Vaccine Mandates Keeps Getting Stronger
When New York required health-care workers to get their shots, the vast majority did. It’s only the latest in a series of underappreciated success stories.
Other governors, take note.
Photographer: Angela Weiss/AFP/Getty Images
Vaccine mandates work. Just ask New York Governor Kathy Hochul, whose state gave roughly 600,000 health care workers until this past Monday to get a Covid-19 jab or lose their jobs. Much naysaying ensued, accompanied by predictions that doctors, nurses, orderlies and other holdouts would quit en masse rather than allow a needle to compromise their liberty. They’ve chosen instead to do the right thing.
Thousands got their shots and, as of this week, 87% of New York’s hospital workers were fully vaccinated — up from 77% in mid-August. About 92% of hospital staff have received at least one dose, as have some 92% of nursing home workers and 89% of adult care workers.