COVID-19: New Rochelle hospital gives illegal vaccines
The vaccines were given due to Montefiore 'misinterpreting state guidelines' • Cuomo and de Blasio continue to clash, NYC mayor vows to vaccinate city workers and elderly Monday
By AARON REICHA woman holds a small bottle labeled with a "Vaccine COVID-19" sticker and a medical syringe in this illustration taken April 10, 2020.(photo credit: REUTERS)
New Rochelle Mayor Noam Bramson was among the first public officials in the state to get the coronavirus vaccine, despite the push to inoculate municipal employees and elected officials being illegal, the New York Post reported Saturday.Bramson, aged 51, was responding to an offer by the Montefiore New Rochelle Hospital, made last Wednesday, and wanted to "demonstrate confidence in [its] safety and efficacy," the New York Post reported. According to local news outlet theJournal News, he also had said hospital officials had told him the state had given them permission to vaccinate city officials and school staff. However, the hospital had reportedly "misinterpreted the state guidelines."The move to vaccinate city officials was illegal under New York Governor Andrew Cuomo's current criteria, which state that the vaccine is currently exclusively available to health care workers, nursing home residents and staff, and certified emergency service responders.Montefiore had also originally planned to make vaccines available for teachers, but the planned rollout was canceled after the state Health Department caught wind and started investigating.Reportedly, the vaccines offered by the hospital were due to the fact that only 23% of the staff had been inoculated, the rest having rejected it despite state guidelines insisting that the first round of vaccines go to them first. Giving them out was an effort to prevent the unused doses from going to waste.Cuomo harshly criticized the vaccine rate of Montefiore's staff, and the hospital could now be facing harsh fines and penalties for breaking the guidelines. According to Journal News, the rest of the hospital's vaccine supply would be given over to the Westchester County Health Department.However, the incident has sparked further clashes between Cuomo and New York City Mayor Bill de Blasio, the latter having been a vocal opponent of the governor's policy regarding vaccination eligibility due to it being too restrictive and preventing the vaccine from being given to front line workers, police officers and people aged 75 and over.Speaking to WNYC radio on Friday, de Blasio blasted Cuomo's insistence on stopping Montefiore from giving out the vaccine to more people as "punitive... counterproductive [and] stopping the vaccine from actually being used."He also criticized the punishment methods Cuomo uses to enforce these policies, which include fines of up $1 million and threatening to revoke medical licenses.“I mean, talk about arbitrary and capricious,” de Blasio told the radio station. “They’ve created a situation that’s creating fear and confusion and where doctors can’t act even when they know someone’s vulnerable.”
On Friday, de Blasio also tweeted that New York City would begin vaccinating city workers and elderly residents on Monday.But the incident also leaves New Rochelle school staff in an uproar as they were denied the vaccine after being promised to get it within the week.The Westchester County city was the epicenter of the state's first coronavirus outbreak, which especially hit the city's Jewish community very hard. Though the crisis has lessened since, parts of the city, including downtown, remain a state-imposed yellow zone.
