Recently, President Joe Biden made the decision to mandate COVID-19 vaccinations for all government employees. Not only this, but Biden has also required that health care workers and people who work at hospitals that take federal funding must also get vaccinated. Additionally, the Occupational Safety and Health Administration (OSHA) has required that any company with more than 100 workers must mandate vaccinations or require their employees to be tested once a week for COVID-19. It is estimated that this new mandate will be imposed on about 100 million people.
While it is unclear how OSHA and the White House plan on implementing this new mandate, it is clear that they hope that this mandate pushes a majority of people to get vaccinated on their own. However, it is still very unclear what the response will be from this mandate. Immediately, there was backlash from conservatives arguing that the president does not have the authority to implement this mandate, and neither does OSHA. Conservatives have been pushing that, vaccinations are a matter of personal liberty and that the government cannot tell people whether or not to get vaccinated. On the other hand, non-conservatives have been arguing that this is not a matter of personal liberty, but rather an issue of public health.
While there are many things up in the air after Biden announced the mandate, one thing is not up in the air, the number of Americans, including the President, that are beyond frustrated with the increase in COVID-19 cases due to the Delta variant. As President Biden has stated, “this is a pandemic of the unvaccinated, and it’s caused by the fact that despite America having an unprecedented and successful vaccination program, despite the fact that for almost five months free vaccines have been available in 80,000 different locations, we still have nearly 80 million Americans who have failed to get a shot. And a distinct minority of Americans supported by a distinct minority of elected officials are keeping us from turning a corner. We’ve been patient, but our patience is wearing thin. And your refusal has cost all of us.”
The New York Times has reported that the United States vaccination rate of 52.7 will soon be the lowest among the wealthiest and largest democracies in the world. The United States has already fallen behind Canada, Great Britain, France, Germany, Italy, and is projected to fall behind Japan in the coming weeks. While it is not clear whether this vaccine mandate will work, the message our president is trying to send us is clear: Get vaccinated, slow the spread.