By QUINTON SMITH/YachatsNews.com
and LYNNE TERRY/Oregon Capital Chronicle
Schools and medical providers in Lincoln County who fall under the governor’s vaccination mandate say they have compliance rates of 93 percent to 96 percent with only a handful of people in each organization resigning from their jobs rather than get vaccinated.
Gov. Kate Brown issued a mandate this summer that requires all state executive branch employees, medical providers and anyone who works or volunteers in schools to be fully vaccinated by Oct. 18. Because it takes two weeks for full inoculation to kick in, Monday was the last day for those facing the mandate to get their second Pfizer or Moderna shot or their first Johnson & Johnson shot.
The largest organizations in Lincoln County affected by the mandate are Samaritan Health Services and the Lincoln County School District.
Of the 461 employees at Samaritan Pacific Communities Hospital in Newport, nearly 95 percent have been vaccinated with 23 more still in the process, said Dr. Lesley Ogden, chief executive officer of Samaritan’s two hospitals in the county. There have been 21 religious exemptions granted in Newport, she said, and one pending medical exemption.
The same vaccination percentage holds true of the 344 employees at Samaritan North Lincoln Hospital in Lincoln City, Ogden said. There are nine religious exemptions there.
There have been three resignations of SHS employees in Lincoln County, Ogden said, all in support service areas.
“We’ll be at 98 percent when it’s all said and done,” she told YachatsNews. “I don’t have any concerns about our work force. Most here were comfortable (getting the vaccine).”
The Lincoln County School District has 310 licensed and 260 classified employees and 93 percent of them are fully vaccinated, said Tiana Tucker, the district’s human resources director.
Less than 1 percent – or about 5 — chose to resign rather than get vaccinated or seek an exemption, Tucker said.
Sodexo, which provides food service and custodial services to the school district, said all of its current 32 kitchen staff are fully vaccinated, said Patty Graves, general manager of its food service operation. Four staff quit due to the vaccination requirements, she said.
But Graves said she usually has 45 food service workers and has struggled to fill jobs.
Of the 650 full- and part-time employees of Lincoln County’s government, 165 fall under the governor’s mandate because they provide medical services, in the jail or other facilities, and work with juveniles, said county spokesman Casey Miller.
Of those, Miller said nearly 94 percent are vaccinated. Including medical and religious exemptions, the rate rises to nearly 97 percent, he said.
Rather than require employees to get vaccinated or seek an exemption, the county commissioners decided to offer a $500 bonus to any full or part-time employee who shows proof of vaccination. Miller said 77 percent of county employees have done so.
Lincoln County Sheriff Curtis Landers said five out of his department’s employees fall under the governor’s mandate. Four are vaccinated and one has an exemption, he said.
Pacific West Ambulance, which provides ambulance service to most of Lincoln County, anticipates losing up to four paramedics or emergency medical technicians out of its current contingent of 38, said general manager Jeff Mathia.
The governor’s mandate does not apply to community colleges. Oregon Coast Community College urged but did not require employees to get vaccinated.
The county’s overall vaccination rate for people 16 and older is 80 percent, according to Lincoln County Public Health, the fourth-highest in Oregon.
OHA director urges restraint
The head of the Oregon Health Authority is advising the state and employers of health care staff, educators and others facing the Oct. 18 vaccine mandate not to fire employees over the deadline.
“Everybody doesn’t need to turn into a pumpkin on the 18th,” OHA director Patrick Allen said Tuesday. “But they can’t be in an in-patient- and student-facing work anymore at that point.”
The agency is advising employers to let staff work remotely, take vacation time or unpaid leave to meet the deadline, he told the Oregon Health Policy Board on Tuesday. The board advises the state agency.
“There’s flexibility to not actually have to terminate people,” Allen said. “But people still really do need to get vaccinated.”
The state will allow opt-outs for medical or religious reasons but it is not tracking exemptions. A health authority official said it’s up to each employer to police the mandate.
Some hospitals set earlier deadlines for vaccination, including Portland-based Legacy Health, which gave staff until Sept. 30. By the deadline, nearly 800 health care staff had not been vaccinated, said Kristen Whitney, spokesperson for Legacy. She said this week that the number has since come down to about 700.
Several lawsuits filed against the governor and the state seek an injunction against the mandate.
They include a complaint filed Sept. 9 by the Oregon Fraternal Order of Police, a group of 100 Oregon State Police employees, the Kingsley Firefighters Association Inc. in Klamath County and more than 30 individuals. The suit claims the mandate is illegal because it forces employees “who want to exercise control over their own medical treatment” to choose “between their rights, privileges and liberties as citizens on the one hand and their employment, careers and financial futures on the other.”
The suit is pending in Jefferson County Circuit Court. A similar suit was filed in U.S. District Court in Eugene by the Freedom Foundation.
Another group, Oregon Healthcare Workers for Medical Freedom, based in Klamath Falls, filed a suit in the Oregon Court of Appeals as did a group called Free Oregon, based in Tualatin. All of those suits are pending.
Allen told the policy board that he didn’t think that Oregon would face a deluge of employees leaving their jobs because of the mandate, but he acknowledged that any loss would hurt at a time when health care companies are facing a workforce shortage.
“Even a 5% loss rate now is a big deal,” Allen said.
Retired physician John Santa, a member of the Oregon Health Policy Board, said he’s concerned about small health care companies in rural areas losing staff.
“I think the larger health systems are going to do fine. They have a number of management options as far as assigning people to remote work and nonclinical work and putting people on leave,” Santa told the Oregon Capital Chronicle, a new Salem-based news service. “I’m worried about the small practices in rural (Oregon) where there is more hesitancy.”
State data show that an average 80 percent of the state’s health care workforce is now vaccinated though rates vary among professions, with 96 percent of dentists vaccinated compared with only 55 percent of chiropractic assistants.
The current coronavirus surge continues to abate, though slowly, Allen said. The number of cases and people hospitalized has dropped in recent weeks, though the number of patients in intensive care has gone down more slowly. The majority of those hospitalized are unvaccinated, Allen said.
He noted that some people are choosing not to get vaccinated, figuring that if they become infected they can be treated with monoclonal antibodies. These antibodies are made in a lab and are based on the same science used to create the vaccines. Supplies had started to run out in Oregon and across the country. The federal government is now managing supplies with allocations to each state.
Allen said people would be better off getting a shot than waiting for treatment.
“The antibodies are not nearly as effective as actual vaccination,” Allen said.
Vaccinations are increasing, with a seven-day average of more than 11,000 shots a day. Allen said that nearly 80 percent of all adults in Oregon are now vaccinated against Covid-19.
- Oregon Capital Chronicle is a Salem-based news service that focuses on reporting about Oregon state government, politics and policy.