Cuomo issues vaccination mandate for New York state workers, hospital staffers

ALBANY, N.Y. — Following in New York City’s footsteps, New York state is making vaccinations or regular COVID-19 testing mandatory for all state employees.

The state is also going further by ensuring all patient-facing frontline health care workers in state-run hospitals are immunized, Gov. Andrew Cuomo announced Wednesday.

“I think we need dramatic action to get control of this situation,” the governor said during a virtual address delivered to members of the Association for a Better New York. “So in New York, and in our state hospitals, all patient-facing health care workers must get vaccinated. There will be no testing option for patient-facing health care workers.

“That is a point of contact that could be a serious spreading event and we want to make sure those health care workers are vaccinated — period,” he added.

Cuomo’s edict received mixed reviews from unions, with Civil Service Employees Association President Mary Sullivan backing the move.

“We need to continue to be diligent in protecting everyone in New York against COVID, and this helps accomplish that,” Sullivan said in a statement.

New York State Troopers Police Benevolent Association President Thomas Mungeer, meanwhile, said his members were caught off guard by the “abrupt announcement.”

“While we await contact from the governor’s office with more information, we are reviewing our legal options since we believe this is a change in the terms and conditions of our employment,” he said.

The governor said the state is working with unions to implement the new vaccination requirements “quickly and fairly.”

With New York’s seven-day positivity rate reaching 2.04% on Wednesday and hospitalizations rising, Cuomo said the state is still reviewing the federal Centers for Disease Control and Prevention’s new guidance recommending masks be worn regardless of vaccination status in areas with soaring COVID-19 cases.

Senate Majority Leader Andrea Stewart-Cousins, D-Yonkers, and Assembly Speaker Carl Heastie, D-Bronx, meanwhile, issued their own guidance on Wednesday mandating vaccinations or regular testing for all staffers as well as lawmakers.

Similarly, Chief Judge Janet DiFiore and Chief Administrative Lawrence Marks announced that the state’s court system will require judges and nonjudicial employees who have not been vaccinated to undergo regular COVID-19 testing in the coming weeks.

Cuomo’s vaccination plan is the latest in a running tab of measures the governor initially downplayed as they were first implemented or floated by Mayor Bill de Blasio before ultimately adopting them.

The pair of politicians, known for their yearslong feud, have butted heads time and time again throughout the pandemic.

Last year, as New York became the epicenter of the COVID-19 crisis in the U.S., Cuomo bristled at the mayor’s suggestion of a lockdown before eventually instituting his “New York Pause” initiative.

He similarly scoffed at de Blasio’s backing of mask-wearing before embracing face coverings last year.

On Wednesday, Cuomo encouraged local governments to consider requiring vaccinations for public employees and said it would likely fall on individual school districts to determine whether to mandate teachers get immunized or implement mask mandates for kids in the fall.

“If the numbers keep going up the way they’re going up — I think school districts in those affected areas should strongly consider taking more aggressive action,” he said. “It will be hard, and I understand the politics, but I also understand that if we don’t take the right actions, schools can become superspreaders in September. It will happen, we have seen it happen before.

“Trepidation and politics, that stops and feeds the virus,” he added.

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