Vaccine mandates grow in NY; NYC venues to start checking

Vaccine mandates are expanding in New York

New York -- Vaccine mandates expanded Monday as New York state ordered hospital and nursing home workers to get COVID-19 inoculations and New York City was poised to start requiring them for anyone in restaurant dining rooms, gyms, museums and many other leisure venues. The new policies aim to goad people into getting vaccinated as New York, like the rest of the U.S., confronts a coronavirus wave powered by the highly infectious delta variant of the virus. As the variant posed a growing threat and vaccination rates leveled off this summer, some cities, states and federal agencies have rapidly shifted from encouraging vaccination to either-or requirements — inoculation or testing — to a flat-out insistence on vaccination for some settings or workforces. “Just buy into this because it’s going to work for all of us, is going to make us all safer,” New York City Mayor Bill de Blasio said Monday.