New York City - New Mandates

[Gooseandamoose]

For anyone who hasn't seen it on the news, NYC mayor Bill de Blasio announced two new vaccine mandates yesterday for New York city

1. All private sector employees will have to be vaccinated without testing as a substitute. This is in addition to the mandates for many public sector workers that are already in place.

1. All children from 5 and up will have to be vaccinated with one shot to access indoor dining, museums and indoor entertainment venues. In addition, "Children between 5 and 11 will also be required to get vaccinated to participate in high-risk extracurricular activities. These activities include sports, band, orchestra, and dance. "

So that's pretty much everyone that will need to be vaccinated to work (unless self employed for the time being anyway) or do anything indoors in NYC, including kids from 5 and up.

Total insanity. Also going to scurper a lot of family holidays to NYC!

Sounds good to me. I'm sure they will make adequate provision for those medically exempt. Indeed, if everyone else just got on with being vaccinated the medically exempt would be better protected, so everyone would be better off. I'd fully include the severely needle phobic as a medical exemption. Although I think we need to put the resources in to devise methods to help them properly. After all needle phobia is not the same as vaccine refusal.

@heldinadream

Sounds good to me. I'm sure they will make adequate provision for those medically exempt. Indeed, if everyone else just got on with being vaccinated the medically exempt would be better protected, so everyone would be better off. I'd fully include the severely needle phobic as a medical exemption. Although I think we need to put the resources in to devise methods to help them properly. After all needle phobia is not the same as vaccine refusal.

So it sounds good to you that young kids from 5 and up will be excluded from everyday venues and extracurricular activities in NYC if their parents aren't sure about giving them the vaccine yet (understandable, it's still pretty new). Really?

What if you’re travelling from abroad? We are due to go there next summer. My 6 and 9 year olds can’t have the vaccines yet

@Andacherryonthetop

What if you’re travelling from abroad? We are due to go there next summer. My 6 and 9 year olds can’t have the vaccines yet

Can't see an exception being made for tourists but I'm sure it will be possible to vaccinate them here before then if you decide to.

That's depressingly shit.
Another erosion of bodily autonomy and informed consent.

And more fuel to the conspiracy theory end of anti-vaxxers. Isolate people off from society and wonder why they fall down rabbit holes. There's going to be a lot of damage to confidence in general take-up of vaccines from places imposing mandates.

I wish we would do it here.

Feel bad for all those who have trips booked. Either cancel or sit outside. There are so many pop up testing stations in NYC at the moment it would make more sense to test for entry until vaccines are available everywhere for that age group.

I have a lot of friends and biz contacts in the US. My impression is New Yorkers are in the main behind this but there is a sizeable minority which are vehemently against. Then if you go to other states and cities, it is a lot more 50-50.
Somehow this whole issue seems to have become politicised. So democrats = pro-mandate, Republican = against.
Never thought I'd find myself backing the right but here we are. The left have lost their marbles over this issue.

I don't agree with what is effectively a vaccine mandate for kids this young but I fear many countries are headed in this direction.

This is a side issue, but out of interest, is the one shot rule for 5-11 year olds because that’s all they’ve decided to give them, or because of the timing of it (with vaccines only recently available to that group) and it will go up to two shots after a period of time when there’s been a chance to actually have two doses?

The mandate itself I think sounds like madness. I hate the idea of them.

This is so depressing.

I wish the mayor of the US city where I live would do the same.

OP, maybe you don't realise how precious you sound?

In the US, almost every state excludes children from school if they're not vaccinated against the usual childhood diseases, requires an annual physical exam on file if a student is playing school sports, annual vision and dental exam, and children where I live have been managing to wear masks every day in school, no exceptions, since schools reopened fully in August.

@Deborah02

This is so depressing.

^THIS

@mathanxiety

I wish the mayor of the US city where I live would do the same.

OP, maybe you don't realise how precious you sound?

In the US, almost every state excludes children from school if they're not vaccinated against the usual childhood diseases, requires an annual physical exam on file if a student is playing school sports, annual vision and dental exam, and children where I live have been managing to wear masks every day in school, no exceptions, since schools reopened fully in August.

There's a difference between kids needing to have childhood immunizations to attend school and kids needing to have vaccine passports to go to a restaurant with their families. Whether or not you think that all kids need to be vaccinated for covid, vaccinating young kids with a vaccine that didn't exist two years ago is not an easy decision for many parents to make. This takes the choice away unless they want their kids to be excluded.

To all of those moaning about mandates - vaccination of children against childhood diseases is mandated in the US in most states.

It's rabbit holes on the internet and the willingness of people with fundamentally flawed reasoning ability to dive into them that have caused the politicisation of the covid vaccine issue (and other pockets of vaccine refusal wrt mmr, dtp, polio, etc) not the other way around.

Choices have consequences. In the case of covid (and also for whooping cough, measles, etc) choices have consequences not only for individuals who refuse them but for the people around them too.

This isn't a right and left conflict. It's a social crisis caused by selfishness that is absolutely baffling.

@mathanxiety calling it selfishness is unhelpful and untrue. In the UK many fully vaccinated adults are cautious over vaccinating their small children. Many are not, and that's fine too.

Good for NYC. Wish they'd bring it in here.

I don’t think this is a bad thing. Most states mandate vaccines anyway and you’re required to show proof of vaccination/dental exams at school enrollment so it’s just an extension of that. No need for all the drama.

@Happypootle, moaning about relatively affluent five year olds excluded from extracurricular activities, tourists not able to take expensive vacations in NYC, and all the rest of the entitlement on this thread is shocking.

The vax mandate is in place to protect the unfortunate people working in the coffee shops, restaurants, hotels, buses, taxis and ride share cars, and all the rest of the people who earn very little while facilitating middle class children's socialization and wealthy people's lifestyles.

The wait staff, the bus boys, the drivers, security guards, baristas and everyone else who has to get out and work in the midst of a pandemic and then go home to their own children have rights too.

@Foolsrule

I don’t think this is a bad thing. Most states mandate vaccines anyway and you’re required to show proof of vaccination/dental exams at school enrollment so it’s just an extension of that. No need for all the drama.

This is batshit. Stop pretending its the same as other childhood vaccines being mandated. Covid vaccines have been around for less than two years and there's an infinitesimally small chance of kids that age getting severe covid. Let parents who are worried have theirs vaccinated. Don't force anyone.

@mathanxiety

To all of those moaning about mandates - vaccination of children against childhood diseases is mandated in the US in most states.

It's rabbit holes on the internet and the willingness of people with fundamentally flawed reasoning ability to dive into them that have caused the politicisation of the covid vaccine issue (and other pockets of vaccine refusal wrt mmr, dtp, polio, etc) not the other way around.

Choices have consequences. In the case of covid (and also for whooping cough, measles, etc) choices have consequences not only for individuals who refuse them but for the people around them too.

This isn't a right and left conflict. It's a social crisis caused by selfishness that is absolutely baffling.

Agreed.

Providing the vaccine exempt are recognised I think the sooner this becomes more widespread the better. I'm not going to change my mind about it.

Total insanity.

Only on MN is a set of regulations to secure and preserve public health called "insanity."

I doubt New Yorkers really care about your family holiday @Gooseandamoose, particularly if you're bringing this disease, or demonstrating your lack of concern for protecting yourself and others against this disease to their beautiful city.

New Yorkers will be just fine without you.

@mathanxiety I suspect there will be frontline workers hesitant over giving the vaccine to their small kids just as much as more 'affluent parents'. They would rather wait for more information or weigh up the arguments. Ultimately they may decide to vaccinate. I believe they should have a choice of testing over vaccination in the meantime. I am a frontline worker myself. If I had small kids (which I don't) i would not be in a rush to vaccinate them. I wouldn't rule it out either. And I don't expect everyone to vaccinate their children to protect me.

I live here. I'm pleased.

Small kids wear masks here far more, I gather, than they are doing so in the UK. Not a big deal and honestly haven't heart anyone upset about kids and masks. Unless there are additional needs - which I wholly support exemptions for.

New Yorkers are taking this seriously from what I can see - I suspect because everyone has holiday plans they don't want fucked up by getting covid and testing positive before a flight etc.

Mask wearing on the subway was up higher again (guesstimate 90% wearing masks correctly after it being about 70% for a while) last week all over Brooklyn and Manhattan from what I saw.

More people, including kids, are wearing masks on the streets again too.

I think many people here are really wary about letting their child get sick with covid, so many will want them vaxxed.

None of the activities the selfish parents are insisting their unvaccinated children should be free to attend are obligatory.

Unlike school, you can easily survive in this world without ballet lessons or weekly trips to a pizza restaurant.

Don't want the vaccine?
Stay home. The workers in your favourite kid friendly restaurant have kids too. And also grandparents, relatives doing chemo, etc .