Arizona s largest employer requires COVID shots as concerns about Third Wave grow
Banner Health s mandates vaccinations for all 45,000 workers. State health director says climbing COVID cases is pandemic of unvaccinated Author: Brahm Resnik Updated: 10:00 PM MST July 20, 2021
PHOENIX People who work for Arizona s largest employer will have to get COVID-19 shots by November if they want to keep working there.
Banner Health is dangling $10,000 prizes to persuade any of its 45,000 employees who are unvaccinated to roll up their sleeves. We care for some of the most vulnerable people in our communities and we owe it to them to take every measure possible to ensure the safest care environment, Peter Fine, president and chief executive officer of Banner Health, said in a companywide email Tuesday.
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Arizona health officials say there is, definitely an uptick in COVID-19 cases across the state, likely due to the highly contagious delta variant.
Both vaccinated and unvaccinated Arizonans should care about the increase in cases because more transmission of the virus raises the likelihood of so-called breakthrough cases, Dr. Cara Christ, the Arizona Department of Health Services director, said this week.
A breakthrough case occurs when someone becomes infected with the SARS-CoV-2 virus, or new coronavirus, that causes COVID-19, even though vaccinated. Such cases are rare, but they do happen.
As of Monday, Arizona had recorded 3,540 breakthrough COVID-19 cases out of more than 3.2 million fully vaccinated people, Steve Elliott, a state health department spokesperson, wrote in an email. Twenty-eight of those vaccinated people are known to have died from COVID-19, Elliott said.
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Gov. Doug Ducey s office has demanded that two Arizona school districts change their policy to quarantine unvaccinated students who are exposed to COVID-19, but the districts legal counsel defended the policy and asked his office to formally withdraw its request.
Ducey s office sent letters ordering the Peoria Unified and Catalina Foothills school districts to “immediately rescind” policies that would require unvaccinated students who have been exposed to COVID-19 to quarantine, but not vaccinated students, because they broke state law. Parents and other local community members have a right to expect that their local school district will do what it reasonably can to provide a safe educational environment, the letter said. Our clients are not acting unlawfully.