Vaccines for teachers are critical for getting our children back to school, yet experts say that the distribution to these frontline workers has been chaotic with wildly uneven access to the drugs. Even within states that have prioritized educators, many school districts still have not vaccinated their teachers.
And some areas have even been chastised for bumping teachers to the top of the list. In Elbert County School District in rural Georgia, officials worked with a local medical center to inoculate school employees. After 40% of the district’s 500 employees got the vaccine, the state cut off the medical center’s vaccine supply for violating state regulations by putting teachers ahead of seniors, according to the Atlanta Journal-Constitution.
The Centers for Disease Control has classified teachers as ''frontline essential workers,'' putting them among the earliest in line to receive the COVID-19 vaccine, says NPR. But access and timelines are sketchy across the country, and some teachers are concerned that the virus will continue to surge in schools when they are finally able to get the shot themselves.
According to USA Today, Megan L. Ranney, an emergency physician who works at the Rhode Island Hospital and is an associate professor at Brown University, said the situation is ''a mess.''
''We’ll be lucky if we get teachers getting vaccinated by March or April in most states,'' she said. Other experts compare the vaccination disparity among teachers to the overall incompetence in vaccinating the general population, according to USA Today.
''This is insanity,'' said Dr. Barry Bloom, a pioneer in the field of global health who has made important contributions to the study of infectious disease and vaccines. The Harvard University professor said there should be a central registry where anyone of the age of 75 can sign up for a vaccination. ''The current distribution process makes very little sense in a time of national emergency.''
He says that pushing teachers to the top of the class when it comes to vaccine priority is a two-edged sword. ''If the focus is on saving lives, as you’ve seen in most states, school teachers don’t score at the top,'' he said. ''If you focus on creating conditions for society to function, I would put teachers at the top,'' adding that the trade-off is up to each state to decide, according to USA Today.
Dr. Anthony Fauci, one of the nation’s leading experts on infectious diseases, said Thursday that everyone ''wants to get teachers vaccinated as fast as we possibly can.'' But he added that schools also need more funds for mitigation equipment like masks and access to regular testing.
''We’re not going to get back to normal until we get the children back in school,'' said Fauci, according to USA Today.
Lynn C. Allison ✉
Lynn C. Allison, a Newsmax health reporter, is an award-winning medical journalist and author of more than 30 self-help books.
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