Biden’s Vaccine Mandate: Unconstitutional, Unscientific, Underhanded

By Mark Hanna, AM THINKER

“Tonight, I’m announcing that the Department of Labor is developing an emergency rule to require all employers with 100 or more employees that together employee[sic] over 80 million workers to ensure their workforces are fully vaccinated, or show a negative test at least once a week,” Biden pontificated on Thursday.

The edict hasn’t actually been issued yet; it is only in the making.  The White House has given itself several weeks — even months, possibly — for OSHA to bring it into force.

After cratering his own approval rating down to an unprecedented 39% — the lowest ever for a Democrat president at this point in his term — Biden seems to have retreated from his imbecilic “Ready, Fire, Aim” Afghanistan withdrawal strategy, which he boastfully executed under an immovable August 31 deadline.

Instead, he’s given himself a flexible timeframe if needed and even an escape route from the mandate if the pushback proves too damaging optically.  This as hundreds, if not thousands, of U.S. citizens, U.S. visa holders, and Western allies still have no escape route from the new Texas-sized Democrat-created terror state of Talibanistan.

The administration may also be looking for a way to turn the conversation from what may become (and some are arguing already is) the greatest hostage crisis in U.S. history.  Could Biden be angling to get the GOP to stop talking about Afghanistan by infuriating them with a king-like edict that tramples the Constitution?  Time will tell.

But if he’s genuinely planning to chain America with an unprecedented mandate, it will almost certainly be found unconstitutional, as were his other recent Constitution-usurping efforts to extend the CDC’s renter eviction moratorium and illegally suspend Trump’s “Remain in Mexico” policy.  The Supreme Court torpedoed both of these Democrat power-enhancing schemes.

With two SCOTUS rebukes after less than eight months in office, it’s become crystal-clear that Biden doesn’t give much credence to the constitutional limits of government — especially if they get in his way of expanding the Democrat power base.

One can imagine Biden reclining in the White House (possibly in a special room in the basement) and dreaming of a Biden-ista Revolution that creates an unstoppable permanent Democrat-controlled federal government, similar to what Democrats have done in California.

This brings us back to Biden’s mandate.  Like the CDC mandate and Biden’s border betrayal, Biden’s handlers have assured and reassured the country that they are on solid legal ground.  The precedent, they say for the mandate, is the 1905 Jacobson v. Massachusetts decision, which states:

[I]n every well-ordered society charged with the duty of conserving the safety of its members the rights of the individual in respect of his liberty may at times, under the pressure of great dangers, be subjected to such restraint, to be enforced by reasonable regulations, as the safety of the general public may demand.

But what Biden and the Democrat dictatorship fail to grasp, or acknowledge, is that much later in 1990, after SCOTUS had ruled that the Constitution affords a right to privacy as part of the liberty the Constitution guarantees, SCOTUS found that “the forcible injection of medication into a non-consenting person’s body represents a substantial interference with that person’s liberty” (Washington v. Harper).

So as long as there is not a demonstrable “great danger” to the general public’s health, the government can’t order you to inject a vaccine into your body.

If we were in a an H5N1 or Black Fungus pandemic where fatality rates were north of 60%, mandates would be not only understandable, but welcomed.  The federal government would not have to twist arms, bribe, and force the population to get vaccinated if a vaccine were available.  More likely, there would be mayhem as people rush to get vaccinated.

But when the government has to use all its power, persuasion, profits, and punishments to push a vaccine, one has to ask, why?  How can a disease be so dangerous to the general public if it has an overall recovery rate, according to the CDC, of greater than 97–98% currently?  It’s a stretch at best to legally there is a “great danger” to society, at least a natural one from the virus.  That there exists a great politically manufactured danger is another story.

“Yeah, but the vaccine has brought us to the 98% recovery point.”  Not true, and here is where the mandate shows its ugly unscientific unevenness.

Even before the vaccine, the recovery rate during the early days of the pandemic in 2020 was between 97% and 99.5%.  As the pandemic progressed, by September 2020 — several months before any vaccines were administered in the U.S. — the CDC said if you’re between the ages of 0 and 70, you have a 99% survival rate.  And if you’re over 70, the survival rate is nearly 95%.

So the survival rate is roughly the same today with the vaccine as at any time during the pandemic.

Facts and science, however, aren’t important to Bolshevik Biden and the MSM (Marxist-Stream Media), the regime’s revolutionary mouthpiece.  But instead of taking him to task on the anti-scientific basis of his mandate, they are bombarding the masses with relentless propaganda framing the unvaxxed as the new evil bourgeoisie.  Disagree, and the Democrat red guards will shout you down, censor you, deplatform you, and threaten you, or, if they can, have you fired.  Marx, Lenin and Mao would be proud.

But the science cannot be shouted down, and so, eventually, it will eviscerate the mandate, not only in courts of law, but the court of public opinion.

One of the most obvious scientific facts the mandate completely ignores is that there have been 41 million+ confirmed cases of COVID19 in the U.S.  Add a mega-million more on to that number for the many asymptomatic cases that were never confirmed with a test.  Add even more for the mild and moderate cases that were never reported since the infected knew they would recover just fine.

Whatever that number is, these previously infected are probably the most immune of all.  At least that’s what the science is telling us.  According the National Institutes of Health, more than 95% of those who have been infected develop lasting immunity similar to those vaccinated.

Science magazine reported in a groundbreaking study done in Israel last month that those who have recovered from COVID-19 have 13 times the immunity protection as those who have been vaccinated.

And according to a study published in Nature Communication, the 41million–plus who have been infected have or have had at least seven months of lasting immunity via stable antibodies (the NIH study found up to 8 months).  However, those who have been vaccinated, according to a study released last month by researchers at Oxford university, see a much faster rate of immunity decline.  According to their results, the Pfizer vaccine decays in immunity and protection by as much as 22% for every 30 days after the second dose.  Natural immunity doesn’t.

Science invalidates Biden’s mandate, which unjustly and illegally discriminates against those who have had COVID-19 and likely have better immunity than those vaccinated.  But there is no exception in his dictate for the tens of millions with natural immunity.  Then again, leftist revolutions don’t make exceptions, only extinctions.

The blatant unconstitutionality, illegality, and unscientific hypocrisy of the Biden mandate  — if it ever really becomes one — will sink it.  And if not in the courts, in the states, where nearly half the nation has already affirmed that it will not comply.

Mark Hanna holds an M.A. in international studies and has provided briefings to government officials on immigration, radical Islam, and other national security issues.  He has worked for CNN as well as NBC and PBS affiliates and has been published in Real Clear Politics, PJMedia, ZeroHedge, and The Investigative Project.  He can be reached at mhanna@protonmail.com.

September 11, 2021 | 14 Comments »

Subscribe to Israpundit Daily Digest

Leave a Reply

14 Comments / 14 Comments

  1. @Adam
    You describe our current situation quite aptly, unfortunately. I am always so refreshed when listening to Dr. Fleming, as his determined sense of victory is ever-present and always serves to be quite inspiring, but I have to admit that we are in a very badly disadvantaged position with our opposition holding every asset and having no compunction from employing them against us. It isn’t that we don’t have proof of crimes, it’s that crimes aren’t accepted as criminal any more. Murder and medical torture, are there any more treacherous crimes than these? And yet the police of Cooke County were present and ejected Veronica’s legal representative from the hospital without cause, stating that Veronica was legally competent even as they ignored her demands to release her from their custody and stop their toxic treatments. She touched many people with her efforts on the People’s Bridge, but her murder has its own message for us all.

    I have to admit that I am deeply saddened by Veronica’s murder. She quite captured the spirit of the founding fathers, for whom she was quite fond and never allowed herself to be broken even as she was quite caught in this medical nightmare. It was a cruel and brutal manner under which they left her quite isolated and cut off from every legal and medical remedy while they applied their poisonous Remdisivir unto her while withholding fluid therapy to quicken its toxic effects – and even then she still fought them, recording their comments on her phone and opposing their domination over her the best she could.

    As cold and ruthless as this was, I don’t know if her murder was planned due to her political character, and that is the more terrifying possibility, in truth. Nearly 700K of her fellow Americans have died similarly, and nearly 4million more outside the US. Perhaps the lack of fluid administration was a unique finding in Veronica’s murder, but the medicinal assassination that ended her life, with or without special intent, also served to dispatch every other patient suffering from this terrible, manufactured hell we are fighting without treatments.

    Thomas Renz, the lawyer for America’s Front Line Doctors is now reporting that doctors are now withholding sufficient caloric support, ie food, from the patients which is causing their murders to advance more quickly. It is eerily coincident that I would hear his report on this just a few hours prior to the treachery conducted against Veronica unfold. I am reminded of the words or the Hawaiian Board Certified Health Technician, who stated to keep your elderly with Covid from the hospitals as they were not receiving any care or assistance. I find these matters deeply disturbing, but best we accept the reality we face than to surrender our fate to a similar outcome to those that are now being reported. Based on the common villainy of these reports, to what choices are we left to choose? Surrender our fate to a share in this murder-management or refuse the support of hospitalization? This is the message I find scribed in the murder of Victoria Wolski. It is quite a choice between Scylla and Charybdis. With a strong determination to survive this gambit, I find the only victory to be had is to avoid such choices entirely, ie seek Early Treatment or prophylaxis regardless of your faith or distrust in vaccination. As I say, you describe our situation far too well, for any to be comforted by its terrible lessons.

  2. Peloni, this story of how Ms. Veronica Wolski was murdered by the hospital’s physicians, and denied all of her legal and human rights even before she was “euthanized,” is the most shocking and disgusting report that I have yet heard about our country’s scandalous medical tyranny. I wish there was some way to find out if her killing was politically motivated by her outspoken support for Trump and her opposition to compulsary vaccination. vaccination.

    As America descends ever deeper into tyranny and ignorance, with physicians playing a leading role in the process, I can’t help but feel deeply saddened. Is there any way out of this dark cavern that our leaders, and the leaders of the world “globalist” oganizations the United Nations and it s medical arm WHO, the Davos group whatever its name is, etc. With al our technology, we are descending into medieval ignorance, tyranny and despotism.

  3. I am not sure who is familiar with Veronica Wolski. She has been an infamous member of the MAGA movement with her freedom oriented displays on “the People’s Bridge” over Kennedy Expressway in Chicago. I became familiar with her signage from photos and videos being shared by many many people over many social media accounts. Her displays have born support for Gen. Flynn during his legal battle, President Trump throughout the election coup, the peoples rights to election integrity, medical rights to have an input into their treatments and many other topics. I was always quite en-heartened by her unabashed determination to fight for her beliefs.

    I was shocked to hear on Sunday that Veronica was trapped in a hospital nightmare, where the hospital staff were trying to force her into being placed on a ventilator while she was repeatedly denied access to her legal representative and friend. Lin Wood entered into this fight as an ambulance waited to take Veronica from the hospital, but the hospital refused to release her.

    Lin Wood covered much of this story on his Telegram over the past 48hrs. Stew Peters devoted most of his show to Veronica’s struggle to receive the IVM treatment and not the toxic Remdisivir. Veronica’s friend and legal representative tells how Veronica was forced to take remdisivir while not even fluids were dispensed to her. Veronica died on Sunday night.

    Here is the link for Stew Peterson’s show:
    https://www.redvoicemedia.com/2021/09/killed-by-tyranny-veronica-wolskis-doctor-speaks-out/
    https://www.redvoicemedia.com/2021/09/exclusive-veronica-wolskis-power-of-attorney-speaks-out-after-tyrannical-killing/

  4. @Edgar
    Melatonin is best known as a sleep aid, but it also assists with the immune system, blood pressure, blood cortisol levels and serves as an antioxidant. It may also have a special use for Covid as it antagonizes the virus, though as with everything on Covid this is not well studied and hence, there is some debate on this point. I think the use of aspirin is used by a lot of people as the concerns of blood clots are quite significant. For myself, I see that more on a treatment of established disease than preventative, but many use it for matters beyond Covid on a daily basis as well. Do mention it if you have to go to the hospital for anything. I am sure you already know this, but a good friend of mine went to the hospital after being injured while camping with his family and he never told the hospital staff about him taking daily aspirin, as he didn’t consider it a “medication”, as he later informed me. I have always chided him for his lack of care in such emergency situations, but this could have had serious consequences. Still all is well that ends well and he survived the surgery, but with more blood loss than was expected by the surgeon.

    The story of your son’s treatment is what most are faced with using as these malignant govts prevent the use of treatments. There are, however, doctors who will provide the treatments such as IVM, and pharmacies that will dispense them.

    Here are a couple of sources for doctors who may be more inclined to treat/prevent Covid:
    https://americasfrontlinedoctors.org/treatments/how-do-i-get-covid-19-medication/

    or

    https://www.exstnc.com/

    I share your thoughts on Zelenko. I saw him a couple of weeks ago on Stew Peter’s show. Peters referenced a longer interview with Zelenko in the coming weeks, but we’ll see…

  5. @ Peloni.

    It’s all very well, but IVM is a prescription med and doctors won’t give it on request, And are very much against using it as a prophilaxis. I would like to have it handy.

    As for Melatonin, I had no idea that it was good for anything. Its reputation is as a sleep med, but, having had sleep problems for many years, recall taking about 25 units in a succession of 5x5s, I wanted to find a sleep med without always needing a dr appt. It was useless-for sleep anyhow, and am glad that it works on something. that is-if it really does. I suspect that it’s purely for psychological reasons that you recommend it.

    We are sounding like Catholics in a confessional box, so I will join in too. ADAM, buck up my lad, I’m surprised you have eaten so unhealthily. Being so careful and excellent in research, I assumed equally careful in diet. Make yourself sick thinking of MY breakfast. Oatmeal w/raisins/banana- (and yoghurt). EVERY DAY. from childhood. I LIKE IT. No lunch. No meat since age about 26

    Peloni, a doctor who would hate exercise, whilst advocating is quite normal. I had several friends like that -prescribing but not partaking. . Yes…running in place is as boring as blazes, and harder on the knees than moving. BUT,,,,,,,,, at a certain age, we can’t be dashing around the tennis court. We are not Gustavs.

    I recently got a treadmill and FORCE myself to do 10-15 mins. And NOT daily by any means-NO. But when young, played tournament level tennis, table-tennis , boxing, rugby, cricket, and loved them all. A meniscus tear about aged 65 finished tennis, and TT a little earlier by moving to a non TT area.

    I strongly believe in daily asperin, also Vits D3, C+ (inc.many Vits mix), also E, B Complex and Omega 3. Even with the havoc created by COVID , it seems not as deadly as past epidemics, although more widespread. I read about them, never thought they meant ME, and have never even had a flu shot.. Lucky, -but not with lotteries.

    Perhaps I have some natural immunity,-if there is such a thing…….but no desire to mix around to find out.

    My son got COVID last Feb, treated it with Tylenol and booze. Recently got first Vaccine shot. ??? Has anyone heard how Zelenko is??
    Poor guy.

  6. @Adam
    Nearly. The N-acetyl Cysteine (everyone just calls it NAC) and the melatonin are both very helpful in daily life, aside from the world facing a fake pandemic. I would use these with the prophylaxis of IVM and Vitamin D and Zn.

    There is a drug called Quercetin that you referenced elsewhere which is very similar to HCQ in its actions and some, such as Zelenko, might add it or HCQ to this regimen, but if I were to increase the prophylaxic recipe, I would further support the immune system with some methylating compounds or antioxidants but a good diet will make this unnecessary.

    Your comments on a lack of healthy eating and exercise is fairly shared among many people, myself included. Still, such things can make an enormous difference if you need to fight this disease. For myself, I hate healthy foods and resent the use of physical exercise that is not purposeful, ie I do feel very foolish running in place or doing some such non-productive exercise. It’s not the effort involved, as I have always had an active life, but laboring while accomplishing nothing is not something I have ever been good at and I will confess that I stil am not. But if the use of these drugs, such as NAC or Querciten which were each only very recently(this past April) made prescription-based, are restricted further we will only have our established health to fight off the unkind effects of this disease and remdisiver. So, as much as I hate healthy foods and resent the exercise, I try to keep to them.

    Oh, one more very important point. As we enter the winter months, people tend to drink less. We all do it and it is related to the cyclic nature of the winter flu season. Keeping your fluid intake up increases the ability to prevent viruses gaining access to the deep portions of the lung where the pneumonia becomes established. With this in mind, healthy people should be advised to drink 4-6 glasses of water/fluids a day if they are in good health – again always confirm with your physician as this could have a bearing on blood pressure, heart and kidney issues.

  7. Peloni.just to make sure I understand you: you recommend either HXCL or Ivo as prophylactics, together with Vitamin D as the best prophylactics, with a modest amount of zinc added.. You also recommend these meds/vitamins/minerals as early treatments, together with a number of other medications, such as melatonin and monoclonal antibodies. But these additional meds/substances are not helpful as prophylaxis. Do I understand you correctly?

    As for your suggestions regarding exercise, fresh air, improved and healthier diet, socializing, and overcoming excessive fear and panic, adopting a positive attitude towards life, avoiding excessive fear and anxiety, etc., I agree 1,000 per cent. However, I am having to struggle to achieve these beneficial lifestyle changes, because of seventy years years of eating unhealthy food, and a higher than normal anxiety level since early childhood. Perhaps it is an inherited tendency. However, I have found that prayer has helped me a lot to improve my habits and adopt a more positive, optimistic frame of mind.

  8. @Adam

    Additionally beyond medicines and supplementals there are other factors that will greatly affect a better defense to the Covid disease. Fresh air and sunlight, good exercise and healthy diet each play an essential role towards supporting the body’s defenses. If someone is forced into lockdown and can’t leave their home, keep windows open, even in the winter – even a window left slightly opened can create a 10% decrease in contaminated air. The greatly reduced exercise, tendency towards consumption of comfort food(high fat, high simple sugars), reduction of Vitamin D associated with limited access to sunlight and the concentration of recycled, possibly infected air with rising concentrations, each work towards the establishment of disease and each is a consequence of this contraindicated policy of lockdowns and home-bound isolations.

    Masks don’t work, and can spread diseases including fungal infections, bacterial infections and viral infections, including Covid. Routine washing hands or hand sanitizer if soap and water is unavailable, is very important, but the hand sanitizer is not my favorite product(soap and water is much better contrary to what some people may think). Oral and nasal hygiene is pivotal as this is where the disease enters the body and where the PCR test sample comes from, so use oral and nasal antimicrobial washes to keep infective particles from establishing disease and to keep dead virus particles from giving a false-positive PCR result which may result in you being cloistered with the infected without any treatment. They do have a new IVM/HCQ nasal spray, but I would not prefer it over the usual treatments discussed earlier, regardless of its claims of efficacy.

    Don’t be apprehensive about meeting people, just as the clinical staff should not be apprehensive about treating people. Stress lowers the immune system, and affords the virus an open beachhead. Fears often force people towards self destructive measures, as these few points I share will reflect. We are each in G_d’s power. If we respect the gifts to which we were each born and the rights to which we are each endowed, while exploring a reasonable approach to this disease, devoid of fear or foolish desires of being saved by the state, as with most things in life, we will each achieve the greatest possible outcome, I believe.

    As simple as it is to treat this disease, I have often pondered what a state of affairs we would all be facing if the disease really was the un-treatable terror they would like you to believe it is. Thankfully, it is not, and the only thing we need to fear is acting foolishly, or being forced to undergo the results of foolish state-born policies.

  9. @Adam
    Prophylaxis is very different from treatment. In treatment the infectious virus is inside the wire, so to speak, and you need to toxify the body to oppose not just the virus, but every consequence of the virus. Prophylaxis is much easier and has been shown in limited (few studies on various medications) to have remarkable impacts upon the preventing the virus from gaining a beachhead – think of the beaches of Normandy. Like Normandy, it took a great concentration of Allied forces to overcome the limited concentration of Nazi forces at Normandy, and thankfully the Allies were able to overcome the existing defenses. Similarly, the virus will likely, in high enough concentrations of exposure overcome the use of limited prophylaxis, but from the limited testing on prophylaxis, such simple medical uses are very very effective. So, we should focus on increasing the defenses of our beaches, so to speak.

    I prefer IVM to HCQ. The data is less voluminous in IVM with over 60 studies and HCQ having nearly 300 studies, but the IVM is seen to be better, but it is a nuance which is chosen, as with Early Treatment, you don’t need a perfect defense, as this is just a virus and even if it overwhelms your defenses, with or without prophylaxis, it is completely amendable to the use of Early Treatments(Recall 99.7-99.9% survive with no prophylaxis and being treated with only the toxic Remdisivir). You could take both as the did in India to crush their outbreak in a month, but I think either would be useful enough as a prophylaxis. Additionally the treatment protocols that Zelenko listed for low risk patients are important as they support the normal functioning of the immune system – which is essential. I would add melatonin(careful, it makes you sleepy so take at night) and N-acetyl cysteine to this protocol as well. It comes to a number of pills, unfortunately, and can be intimidating for people, such as my own mother, who are unwilling to use so many pills without a present illness. If I had to limit things to two treatments, it would be IVM and Vitamin D. Nothing works in the immune system without Vitamin D(overstatement but makes the point). Proper levels of Vitamin D is also the best indicator of survivability should disease become established.

    If someone becomes exposed by having met an infected individual, I would add the treatment of the high exposure protocol that Zelenko noted – there is no downside and preventing every part of this disease is very important. The optional choices of Colchisine(speeds recovery), Monoclonal Antibodies(limits disease), and aspirin(usually enough to prevent clots) would be my preference. The fatalities of Covid are no more lethal than an untreated the flu, but the consequences of Covid can be much worse, so best to prevent it as best we can.

    I think there is a propensity to treat every condition with Vitamin C, and there is no downside to it, but it really isn’t shown to be essential to the treatment. Also Vitamin D and Zinc each have a consequence of having levels too high, so these should be monitored and adjusted as needed. As you noted, and thank you for stating it clearly, we should all consult a trusted physician, who actually treats sick people as if they have a need of treatment. Few are in perfect health and many will require a tailored treatment protocol for specific past or present health conditions. The best outcome to this health crisis is to not catch the disease, but don’t take the vax, again in my opinion.

  10. Peloni, this is a genuine, not a rhetorical question. What medications, minerals, etc. do you recommend as prophylaxis for Covid19?

    This is information that will be very useful for me to know (no, I am not asking for medical advice. I would never actually use any med without first consulting with a practicing physician who is competent in infectious disease treatment, preferably one who is recommended by the Association of American Physicians and Surgeons). Be that as it may, I would be grateful if you would share with us what medications/substances that you believe most effective as prophylaxis of cv19,

    I realize that you may have have shared this information with Israpundit readers earlier, but if so I missed it.

    I deeply value yur opinions on this matter as well as on so many matters medically related. Adam.

  11. @Adam

    The fact that so many nurses and other hospital personnel are unwilling to be vaccinated, and that some are even willing to quit their well-paying jobs to avoid vaccination, is significant

    A limit of qualified nurses reduces the number of critical care and emergency beds a hospital can have. Even if they overburden the remaining nurses, the wave of firings will expose this built-in dependency of hospital management as being more dependent upon the healthcare staff than the billing adjusters – much as was seen in the article you shared below. In the coming days/weeks as flu/Delta cases rise you will likely hear again about the bed shortages. Of course, what they call a bed shortage will actually be a shortage of qualified care providers which is the result of this current mandate.

  12. The fact that so many nurses and other hospital personnel are unwilling to be vaccinated, and that some are even willing to quit their well-paying jobs to avoid vaccination, is significant, because these are individuals are likely to be far more knowledgeable about both the covid19 virus and the vaccines used aa prophylaxis for it than the general population. Clearly many are convinced that the vaccines are more dangerous to their health than the virus. EMS workers also have a high rate of “vaccine hesitancy.

    New York City’s teachers are so opposed to compulsary vaccination that they have refused to go back to work if they are required to be vaccinated. Their union is fighting vigorously before an arbitration court to have the city’s vaccination mandate lifted. And they have threatened to appeal to the regular courts if the arbitration goes against them. This is significant because teachers are usually better educated than the general population, and therefore are likely to be more knowledgeable about both the virus vs. the vaccines than the “average” person.

    According to one poll, Ph.Ds are the group that has the highest rate of vaccine hesitancy in the American population.

    Civil service workers of all kinds seem to have a high rate of vaccine “hesitancy” all accross the country. Nearly all of their usions have resisted the vaccine mandates. Postal workers have succeeded in obtaining a complete exemption from the Federal vaccine mandate. At least up until very recently, the president has not required his own staff to be vaccinated.

    It is interesting that the people who are most likely to have extensive contact with strangers as part of their daily work routine are so resistant to the vaccine mandates. One would thing that their exceptionally high level of exposure to the virus would make them very supportive of the vaccines mandates. But this is not the case.

  13. Hospital to stop delivering babies as maternity workers resign over vaccine mandate
    LOWVILLE, New York (WWNY) – Lewis County General Hospital will stop delivering babies after September 24 because too many maternity unit workers have resigned over COVID vaccination mandates.

    That’s according to Lewis County Health System Chief Executive Officer Gerald Cayer, who held a news conference Friday in Lowville.

    He said 6 employees in the maternity unit resigned rather than get a COVID shot and another 7 are undecided.

    According to Cayer, the hospital will be unable to safely staff the unit and will pause delivering babies after September 24.

    He said he hopes this is a temporary situation and will work with the state Department of Health to make sure the unit won’t permanently close.

    “If we can pause the service and now focus on recruiting nurses who are vaccinated, we will be able to reengage in delivering babies here in Lewis County,” said Cayer.

    Cayer said 165 hospital employees have yet to be vaccinated against COVID-19; that’s 27 percent of the workforce.

    The other 464 workers, or 73 percent of employees, have gotten their shots, he said.

    In August, the state announced all health care workers at hospitals and long-term care facilities across New York would be required to have gotten at least their first dose of a COVID-19 vaccination by September 27.

    Cayer said the announcement prompted 30 workers to get vaccinated, while another 30 resigned.

    “Our hope is as we get closer (to the deadline), the numbers will increase of individuals who are vaccinated, fewer individuals will leave and maybe, with a little luck, some of those who have resigned will reconsider,” he said. “We are not alone. There are thousands of positions that are open north of the Thruway and now we have a challenge to work through, you know, with the vaccination mandate.”

    He added that Lewis County, as a whole, has the state’s highest 7-day average percentage of positive COVID test results reported over the last 3 days.

    Copyright 2021 WWNY. All rights reserved.