Month: August 2021

Categories
Health

WHO says some information suggests elevated danger of hospitalization

WHO says some data suggests increased risk of hospitalization

Maria Van Kerkhove, Head of the Emerging Diseases and Zoonosis Division of the World Health Organization, speaks during a press conference following a meeting of the Emergency Committee on the new coronavirus in Geneva on January 22, 2020.

Pierre Albouy | AFP | Getty Images

A senior World Health Organization official said Tuesday that data from some countries may suggest that the Delta variant puts those infected at increased risk of hospitalization, but doesn’t necessarily kill more people than other strains.

“In terms of severity, we’ve seen some countries suggest an increased risk of hospitalization for people with a Delta variant. We haven’t seen this lead to an increased death rate, ”said Maria Van Kerkhove, WHO technical director on Covid-19. People infected with the Delta variant “didn’t die more often than the other strains,” she said.

Health officials have been grappling with the question for months, waiting for real data in countries where the delta variant is widespread. Van Kerkhove said WHO officials meet daily to discuss the rapidly spreading variant.

Like other strains, the Delta variant is especially dangerous for people with underlying conditions like obesity, diabetes, or heart disease, say WHO officials. However, it is far more contagious than other varieties, so it infects more people and puts a strain on global health systems.

“The risk factors for serious illness and death are the same,” said Van Kerkhove. “If you have underlying illnesses, regardless of your age, you have an increased risk of hospitalization.”

The Delta variant also quickly overtakes all other variants wherever it is recognized, she said.

“The prevalence of the lambda variant is falling … and the delta variant is increasing,” said Van Kerhove. “The delta variant quickly replaces other variants that are in circulation wherever it is identified.”

It is spreading in Central and South American countries and is quickly overtaking the lambda variant that is currently predominant there.

“We still don’t know exactly what impact the delta will have on Latin American countries,” said Dr. Sylvain Aldighieri, Incident Manager for the Pan American Health Organization, at a briefing last week.

The delta variant, first discovered by scientists in India in October, has so far spread to at least 142 countries. Found only a few months ago in the US, it now accounts for more than 90% of all sequenced cases, according to the CDC.

The most at risk in the US have been fully vaccinated, with booster doses approved on Friday for people with compromised immune systems and available immediately for administration.

There are currently discussions about opening booster doses to the general population, a move that would violate WHO’s strict recommendations to share doses with the rest of the world before booster doses are given to people who have already received their first vaccinations .

More than 200 million people worldwide have contracted Covid since the pandemic began, doubling from 100 million cases in the past six months. With the more transferable Delta variant spreading rapidly, the number could easily hit 300 million early next year, WHO officials said last week.

“Whether we reach 300 million and how quickly we get there depends on all of us,” WHO Director General Tedros Adhanom Ghebreyesus said last week.

– CNBC’s Robert Towey contributed to this report.

Categories
Entertainment

Los Angeles to Require Masks at Massive Out of doors Concert events and Occasions

Los Angeles to Require Masks at Large Outdoor Concerts and Events

With coronavirus cases continuing to surge, Los Angeles County said Tuesday that masks must be worn at large outdoor concerts and sporting events that attract more than 10,000 people.

The new rule, which comes into effect Thursday at 11:59 p.m., means that visitors to the Hollywood Bowl, Dodger Stadium, outdoor music festivals and events designated by the county as “mega-events” must now wear masks. The rule applies to people regardless of their vaccination status.

People are allowed to take off their masks while eating and drinking, but only for a short time.

The order came as cities across the country took steps to curb the spread of the coronavirus. Chicago joined Los Angeles County, Washington, DC, San Francisco, and other areas to require masks in indoor public spaces. New York City Requires Proof of Vaccination for Indoor Dining and Entertainment Activities; Broadway will require proof of vaccination and masks when it reopens.

The new rules requiring masks at major outdoor events in Los Angeles came when the county reported that cases, hospitalizations, and positivity rates have all increased significantly. According to data collected by the New York Times, Los Angeles County is seeing an average of 3,361 new cases per day, an 18 percent increase from the average two weeks ago.

Los Angeles County has been aggressive in introducing masking requirements amid evidence that the Delta variant of the virus has spread. In the past month, people were forced to wear masks in public indoor spaces, regardless of their vaccination status.

Covid guidelines at the Hollywood Bowl have changed repeatedly over the year as the Los Angeles Philharmonic, which runs the Bowl, tried to adhere to the county’s changing regulations. It has drawn large crowds for the past six weeks. With a few exceptions, the people in the audience were maskless, as allowed by the district rules. But they tend to put on their masks when they join the hustle and bustle of people walking down the crowded sidewalks after the show.

Categories
Health

Racial Inequities Persist in Well being Care Regardless of Expanded Insurance coverage

Racial Inequities Persist in Health Care Despite Expanded Insurance

In Dr. Johnston’s hometown St. Louis, as in other cities, fewer health care providers and specialists are found in low-income and minority neighborhoods, which is a function of structural racism and a legacy of residential segregation, Dr. Johnston said.

“It’s not a question of insurance — it has more to do with the supply side,” he added. “If you want to access a good specialist, your choice of cardiologists is going to be different if you live out in the counties that are more affluent versus if you live in the poor areas in northern St. Louis.”

Another study in the journal compared health care spending by race and ethnicity, finding that at $8,141 per year, spending for white individuals is higher than for Americans of other races and ethnicities, and the portion of it spent on outpatient care is higher than the average.

Health care spending for Black individuals is $7,361 per year, and a smaller proportion of the funds are spent on outpatient care. The amounts that go to pay for care of Black people in an emergency room and hospital are 12 percent and 19 percent higher, respectively, than the nationwide averages.

“This is about poverty, geography and where people live and where primary care clinics are located, and it is about health insurance,” said Joseph Dieleman, an associate professor at the Institute for Health Metrics and Evaluation at the University of Washington in Seattle and an author of the study.

But the difference also reflects patient behavior. “It is also about people’s past experiences with the health care system and the quality of care they or their loved ones have received, which leads to hesitation or resistance to accessing health care early,” Dr. Dieleman said.

The findings may explain some of the disparities in health outcomes, though social and economic factors also play a role, among them poverty, so-called food deserts and neighborhoods that expose residents to pollution and offer few opportunities for physical exercise and recreation.

Categories
Politics

Democratic Sen. Menendez rips Biden administration for ‘flawed’ Afghanistan pullout

Democratic Sen. Menendez rips Biden administration for 'flawed' Afghanistan pullout

U.S. Senator Robert Menendez (D-NJ) questions Zalmay Khalilzad, special envoy for reconciliation to Afghanistan, during a Senate Foreign Affairs Committee hearing on Capitol Hill in Washington, Jan.

Susan Walsh | Swimming pool | Reuters

Senator Robert Menendez, chairman of the Senate Foreign Affairs Committee, vowed to hold the Biden administration accountable for the botched execution of the withdrawal of US troops from Afghanistan.

In a long statement Tuesday, the New Jersey Democrat issued one of the harshest criticisms of President Joe Biden from within the party.

“In implementing this flawed plan, I am disappointed that the Biden administration clearly failed to properly assess the impact of a swift US withdrawal.

“The Senate Foreign Relations Committee will continue to exercise its oversight role with a hearing on US policy towards Afghanistan, including the Trump administration’s flawed negotiations with the Taliban and the Biden administration’s flawed execution of the US withdrawal,” added he added.

The White House did not immediately respond to a request for comment on Menendez’s testimony.

Menendez’s censure comes just days after the Taliban took control of Afghanistan when political leaders and government security forces fled Kabul. Analysts say the well-wired withdrawal of U.S. troops from the country, a plan drafted by the Trump administration and implemented by Biden, is responsible for the Taliban’s rapid advance last week.

The Taliban have so far promised amnesty to former government officials and are currently working with US forces to keep Kabul airport open for military and civilian flights.

CNBC policy

Read more about CNBC’s political coverage:

But Menendez, who called on the Biden government in May to reconsider its planned troop withdrawal, said Tuesday that he intends to use his leadership on the Foreign Relations Committee to “address the looming humanitarian and human rights disaster under a Taliban-led regime” to tackle.

“Our nation’s reputation is at stake and our entire government must make every effort to achieve that goal,” he added. “In connection with our withdrawal and its aftermath, there has been clear policy enforcement and intelligence failures.”

Senator Jim Risch, the senior member of the Foreign Relations Committee, raised similar frustrations on Monday, saying in a press release that the exit of the Biden administration leaves the US vulnerable to future harm.

“This hasty and political decision to withdraw without taking our counter-terrorism priorities into account will allow Afghanistan to serve as the future platform for terrorist attacks against the United States and our partners,” said the Idaho Republican.

Biden defended the withdrawal in a blunt speech on Monday. He described the war in Afghanistan as a lost cause for the US and pointed out how quickly Afghan troops fell to the Taliban. He also said, “The money stops with me.”

Categories
Health

NIH director says new Israel information is constructing case within the U.S.

NIH director says new Israel data is building case in the U.S.

New data from Israel on the effectiveness of Covid-19 vaccines over time is causing U.S. health leaders to rethink their position on vaccine booster shots in the U.S., National Institutes of Health Director Dr. Francis Collins said Tuesday.

“The people who got immunized in January are the ones that are now having more breakthrough cases,” Collins said during an interview on “The Hugh Hewitt Show,” referring to Covid infections in fully vaccinated individuals. Israel released new data Monday showing a reduction in the effectiveness of Pfizer’s Covid vaccine against severe illness among people 65 and older who were fully vaccinated in January or February.

NIH Director Fr. Francis Collins holds up a model of the coronavirus as he testifies before a hearing looking into the budget estimates for National Institute of Health (NIH) and the state of medical research on Capitol Hill in Washington, DC on May 26, 2021.

Sarah Silbiger | AFP | Getty Images

Collins said the rise in so-called breakthrough cases in Israel is likely due to a combination of the highly contagious delta variant and Covid vaccine protection waning over time.

“Mostly, of course, these are symptomatic, but not serious,” he said. “But you’re starting to see a little bit of a trend toward some of those requiring hospitalization.”

Collins’ comments come as federal health officials are expected to recommend that most people in the U.S. who are eligible for Covid vaccinations should get booster shots eight months after their second doses.

The federal guidance, which would apply only to the two-shot Pfizer and Moderna vaccines, could go into effect as early as mid-September, pending FDA authorization, a person familiar with the discussions told CNBC.

The New York Times reported Monday that federal health officials are particularly concerned about data from Israel, where Covid vaccinations began ahead of many other countries. The data reportedly showed that for people vaccinated in January who are age 65 and older, the Pfizer vaccine was less than 55% effective against severe disease and hospitalization.

Collins said Tuesday that federal officials are starting to see the same thing in U.S. data.

“Although right now, it still as if our vaccine protection is working really well,” he said. “But we don’t want to wait until it’s like oh, too late. So that’s why we’re looking at the data.”

Up until now, federal officials haven’t recommended booster doses for the general public. On Friday, they approved administering Covid booster shots of Pfizer’s and Moderna’s vaccines to Americans with weakened immune systems, which includes cancer and HIV patients and people who have had organ transplants.

Covid vaccine makers, including Pfizer and Moderna, have repeatedly contended that everyone will eventually need a booster shot and potentially extra doses every year, just like for the seasonal flu.

The NIH, Food and Drug Administration and the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention released a joint statement Tuesday saying they have a “rigorous process” to determine when boosters would be necessary.

“This process takes into account laboratory data, clinical trial data, and cohort data – which can include data from specific pharmaceutical companies, but does not rely on those data exclusively,” the agencies said. “We continue to review any new data as it becomes available and will keep the public informed.”

On Monday, Pfizer and BioNTech said they have submitted early stage clinical trial data to the FDA as part of their U.S. application seeking authorization of a Covid vaccine booster for everyone 16 and older. The companies said they would seek approval for a booster dose via a supplement to their application once the agency grants the vaccine full approval.

If the booster shots are approved, the U.S. would likely vaccinate nursing homes, health-care providers and the elderly first, Collins said Tuesday. He said “ideally” people should stick with the same manufacturer they got their first two doses from.

“But if for some reason you don’t have access to it, well, then get the other one,” he said. “Again, I’d feel more comfortable as a scientist fixing our plans on real data, and that means sticking to the same kind of vaccine that you got to begin with.”

–CNBC’s Tom Franck contributed to this report.

Categories
World News

Dow falls practically 400 factors as Tuesday’s sell-off intensifies

Dow falls nearly 400 points as Tuesday's sell-off intensifies

US stock indices fell on Tuesday as retail sales fell in July and worries about a slowdown in global economic growth increased.

Still, the losses came Tuesday after the Dow Jones Industrial Average and S&P 500 closed at record highs in the previous session.

The Dow fell 390 points, or 1.1%. The S&P 500 lost 1% and the Nasdaq Composite lost 1.2%.

Retail sales fell 1.1% in July, a decline more than the 0.3% decline expected by Dow Jones’ polls. The Census Bureau corrected the June figure to a jump of 0.7%.

“If we look at expectations for future consumer strength, some of the lead will be diminished by the rise of the Delta variant,” said Yung-Yu Ma of BMO Wealth Management. “These challenges are not going to go away anytime soon.”

Home Depot fell more than 4% after posting second quarter results, hurting the Dow. While quarterly earnings exceeded estimates, sales in the same store rose 4.5% during the reporting period, below the consensus estimate of 5% of analysts surveyed by StreetAccount. In the United States, sales in the same stores only increased 3.4%.

Walmart stocks rose slightly and then traded near the flatline after earnings beat estimates in the second quarter. The retailer grew in the grocery sector and reported a strong start to the back-to-school season.

CNBC Pro’s Stock Picks and Investment Trends:

Disappointing economic data from China on Monday heightened concerns about a slowdown in global growth. Chip stocks fell for a second day on Tuesday, with the iShares Semiconductor ETF down more than 2% and Nvidia about 3%. The shares of Tesla and Boeing, both of which are also heavily dependent on the growth market China, fell.

Meanwhile, technology names were trending downward. Big tech stocks, including Google parent Alphabet, Amazon, Apple and Facebook, traded in the red.

Elsewhere, health stocks saw strength, with the S&P 500 Health Care Sector making record highs. United Health, Merck, and Johnson & Johnson all acted green.

The Dow and S&P 500 closed at record highs in their fifth consecutive positive session on Monday. The move of the S&P 500 during Monday’s session marked a milestone as the benchmark index doubled from its pandemic closing low on March 23, 2020. This is the fastest doubling of the bull market since World War II, according to calculations by CNBC.

Become a smarter investor with CNBC Pro.
Get stock picks, analyst calls, exclusive interviews and access to CNBC TV.
Sign in to get started Try it for free today

Categories
Politics

1000’s of Afghans who helped the U.S. are trapped. What occurs subsequent?

Thousands of Afghans who helped the U.S. are trapped. What happens next?

Tens of thousands of Afghan nationals risked their lives to help the United States military in Afghanistan, many of them working as interpreters in combat. Now, after the Taliban’s takeover, they are desperate to leave — but passage to the United States may prove elusive.

More than 300,000 Afghan civilians have been affiliated with the American mission over its two-decade presence in the country, according to the International Rescue Committee, but a minority qualify for refugee protection in the United States.

About 2,000 such people whose cases already had been approved have arrived in the United States on evacuation flights from Kabul, the capital, that began in July. President Biden said on Monday while addressing the nation that there were plans to airlift more Afghan families in “coming days,” though he provided no details.

Refugee advocates said they feared that thousands of vulnerable people were likely to be left behind, at their peril, as militants tightened their grip on Afghanistan’s territory.

Since 2002, the United States has employed Afghans to assist U.S. troops, diplomats and aid workers. Many were threatened, kidnapped and attacked, and an unknown number killed, as a result of their association with the United States. In response, Congress created the special immigrant visa programs to give such workers a path to legal residency in the United States.

But the programs, which enjoy broad bipartisan support, have been marred by processing delays.

Applicants must show they have been employed for at least two years by the U.S. government or an associated entity. Among other paperwork, they must prove they performed valuable service by providing a recommendation from an American supervisor. They must also show that they have experienced, or are experiencing, a serious threat as a consequence of their work for the United States.

More than 15,000 Afghan nationals, plus family members, have already been resettled in the United States with special immigrant visas, out of a total of 34,500 authorized visas.

At least 18,000 people have applications pending, and that number is expected to increase considerably given the deteriorating situation in Afghanistan.

Critics say that the U.S. government, going back several administrations, has delayed special immigrant visa approvals by demanding an extraordinary amount of documentation as part of an unwieldy 14-step process.

Applicants have faced average wait times of three years, though Congress had specified that it should take no more than nine months. Many have been waiting as long as a decade for the outcome of their cases.

Special immigrant visa recipients are eligible for the same resettlement benefits as refugees. They arrive with green cards, and can apply for U.S. citizenship after five years. But they are not classified as refugees, nor do they count against the number of refugees that the United States commits to admitting each year.

The U.S. government since July has evacuated about 2,000 interpreters and their family members whose cases had already been approved. They were brought from Kabul to the Fort Lee military base south of Richmond, Va., and many have since been sent to cities across the country. But staff members from refugee resettlement agencies were notified after the latest flight landed on Sunday that plans to evacuate more Afghans had been suspended.

Garry Reid, a civilian Pentagon official charged with handling the evacuations, said on Monday that 700 Afghan allies had been evacuated in the previous 48 hours. He said the United States would scale up by receiving more departing Afghans at U.S. military bases, but he did not offer a specific timeline.

The Biden administration also had been negotiating with several countries in the Middle East and Central Asia to temporarily host some people until they can be resettled in the United States. But it was not clear whether it would even be possible to evacuate more Afghan allies, at least for now, given the volatility on the ground.

Categories
Health

Respiration Machine Recall Over Potential Most cancers Threat Leaves Thousands and thousands Scrambling for Substitutes

Breathing Machine Recall Over Possible Cancer Risk Leaves Millions Scrambling for Substitutes

Jayme Rubenstein, a spokesperson for ResMed, said the company is prioritizing the manufacture of devices for patients with immediate ventilation needs, including Covid patients, followed by machines for those with central and obstructive sleep apnea.

In a survey of home medical device providers conducted in April 2020, more than half reported interruptions in the supply chain for CPAP devices and 62 percent reported delays of up to 60 days. The Philips recall “certainly exacerbated the situation,” said Thomas Ryan, chairman of the American Association for Homecare, which commissioned the study and represents the suppliers. (Philips is on his board.)

“Given the shortage of materials to make these devices, such as resins and computer chip modules, and transportation bottlenecks, I expect supply will continue to lag behind demand through 2022,” he said. “It will be a crisis”

Amy Sloane, who learned she had sleep apnea in 2017, began using a DreamStation BiPAP Auto SV device the following year. Overall, she said, her sleep improved. However, after reading about the recall, she became concerned to learn that the sonic cleaning device she was using could break the foam barrier.

“Even more annoying,” she said, “when I manually wiped my DreamStation water tank, there were black particles on the wipe.”

Ms. Sloane, 57, a Baltimore-based attorney, early registered her device with Philips for recall. But she said the company’s only response was to tell her to consult her doctor, who advised her to stop using it immediately. Within a few days, her doctor was able to prescribe a self-adjusting CPAP device from another manufacturer.

As of June, around 40 lawsuits have been filed against Philips on behalf of patients in more than 20 states. Steven Bloch, an attorney for Silver Golub & Teitell in Stamford, Connecticut, said his law firm has filed four lawsuits in Massachusetts, where Philips’ US headquarters are located.

Categories
Entertainment

Nationwide Endowment for the Humanities Publicizes New Grants

National Endowment for the Humanities Announces New Grants

The Morgan Library & Museum, the University of Chicago and the new Georgia O’Keeffe Museum in Santa Fe, N.M., are among 239 beneficiaries of new grants from the National Endowment for the Humanities that were announced on Tuesday.

The grants, which total $28.4 million and are the second round awarded this year, will support projects at museums, libraries, universities and historic sites in 45 states, as well as in Washington, D.C., and Puerto Rico. They will enable the creation of a documentary about the Colfax Massacre — in which dozens of former slaves were killed in a Louisiana town during Reconstruction — by City Lore, a nonprofit New York art gallery; the development of Archaeorover, an autonomous robot that uses ground-penetrating radar to search for buried sites and artifacts, by researchers at the University of Pennsylvania; and research for a biography of the neuroscientist and author Oliver Sacks by Laura J. Snyder, a New York-based writer and researcher.

Adam Wolfson, the endowment’s acting chairman, said in a statement that the projects, which include educational programming for high school and college students and multi-institutional research initiatives, “demonstrate the resilience and breadth of our nation’s humanities institutions and practitioners.”

In New York, 35 projects at the state’s cultural organizations will receive $3.6 million in grants. Funding will support the creation of a new exhibition on the portraiture of the Northern Renaissance artist Hans Holbein the Younger at the Morgan Library & Museum, set to open next Spring; an exhibition at the Queens Museum that will reinterpret its “Panorama of the City of New York” from the World’s Fair in context of its ties to city planning, including how urban expansion reinforced racism and classism, upon the panorama’s 60th anniversary in 2024; and a reinterpretation of the American art galleries at the Brooklyn Museum to focus on underrepresented voices. Those galleries are expected to reopen before 2025.

Funding will also support the storage of 117 Chinese opera costumes and 330 traditional Chinese garments called qipaos that were damaged in a January 2020 fire at the Museum of Chinese in America, as well as the preservation of 70,000 photographs, political cartoons and other materials documenting the 123-year history of the Jewish publication The Forward.

Elsewhere, the grants will assist with the reinterpretation of the colonial Old North Church in Boston and its congregation’s ties to slavery from the American Revolution to the Civil War, support the creation of a digital catalog of the works of Georgia O’Keeffe, and enable publication of a comprehensive, freely available print and online edition of all surviving Greek- and Latin-inscribed legislation from classical Rome by the University of Chicago.

Categories
Health

Airways break up on whether or not to require workers to get Covid photographs

Airlines split on whether to require employees to get Covid shots

A Southwest Airlines jet lands at Midway International Airport in Chicago, Illinois on January 28, 2021.

Scott Olson | Getty Images

U.S. airlines are increasingly divided over whether their flight attendants, pilots and other employees should be vaccinated against Covid-19.

United Airlines and Hawaiian Airlines announced this month that their U.S. employees, a total of around 73,000 people, will need to be vaccinated against the virus. Alaska Airlines is considering a similar mandate for its 20,000 or so employees if the Food and Drug Administration grants full approval to one of the vaccines, a move expected next month.

Other airlines, including Delta Air Lines, American Airlines, Southwest Airlines, and JetBlue Airways, have repeatedly said that they are encouraging but do not require staff to be vaccinated. However, Delta Air Lines requires that new employees be vaccinated.

Pilot unions for these airlines say vaccines should remain voluntary for their members. Following announcements by United and Hawaiian, airline unions that do not require vaccines said pilots expressed concern about what would happen if their airlines followed suit.

Delta variant

The concerns highlight potential challenges carriers could face in also mandating vaccinations. The airlines are all struggling with the recent increase in Covid cases in the US, as the Delta variant prevails and weighs on the demand for air travel – just as the ailing industry began to gain a foothold again.

More than a dozen large US companies have prescribed Covid vaccines for some or all of their employees.

A mandate “could bring an airline into conflict with its unions,” said Ben Baldanza, former CEO of Spirit Airlines.

However, higher Covid cases could affect airline reliability if enough employees are sick, at a time when they are already few and far between.

“You don’t want to touch the third rail, but you want to make sure you have an operation,” said Robert Mann, an aviation consultant and former airline manager.

The latest announcements of vaccine mandates or their lack of vaccine mandates by the airlines have received criticism and praise from both sides on social media. Baldanza said he doesn’t think vaccine status will be a determining factor in booking flights.

Infections are increasing

At the same time, some unions argue that airlines could do more to boost vaccination rates, or urge pilots to use incentives such as extra vaccination time off, especially as the fast-spreading Delta variant is driving the new Covid-19 infections.

The Allied Pilots Association, which represents about 15,000 pilots at American Airlines on Thursday, told members that weekly cases of Covid-19 among pilots have hit an “all-time high,” rising to 36 in the first week of August, double that number as before three weeks earlier.

According to the union, five pilots were hospitalized for Covid-19 on August 12.

“It’s worth noting that none of these pilots have been vaccinated against the virus,” the union’s aero-medical group said.

About 60% of American Airlines pilots are vaccinated, according to a union announcement earlier this month. More than 90% of United pilots are vaccinated, the airline said. United previously offered flight attendants and pilots incentives to get vaccinated.

Encouraging, not demanding

Southwest Airlines reiterated to staff last week that it has not changed its stance on encouraging, but not requiring, staff to be vaccinated.

But Southwest Airlines Pilots Association president Casey Murray last week called on the company to discuss its vaccine plans and stated in a letter to the airline that its current policy is “obviously not set in stone”.

Murray told CNBC that some pilots have told the union that they are concerned about possible side effects from the gunshots, including long-term side effects that may take a while to show up and subsequent loss of paid sick leave or even their medical clearance issued to the Flying is required. The Senior Medical Advisor to the White House, Dr. Anthony Fauci said that “almost all” long-term vaccine side effects occur within the first two months of being vaccinated.

Meanwhile, Murray said the number of Covid cases among pilots is increasing but declined to provide numbers.

Corporate incentives

He said the company should establish guidelines and incentives that could include paying a federally mandated 48-hour wait for pilots to fly before they can fly after each dose of Pfizer or Moderna vaccine.

“Talking to the company will go a long way towards allaying those fears,” he said.

Murray noted in his letter that Southwest did not offer pilots incentives to vaccinate as Delta, American, and United did, such as extra time off or extra pay. Offering around $ 15 worth of points on an internal platform was “undoubtedly less effective than the real incentives negotiated by the other airlines with their unions,” he wrote to the company, according to a person familiar with the matter .

“Now that we are facing the escalation of the Delta variant crisis, this will prove significant,” he said.

Ed Bastian, Delta CEO, said last week a vaccine mandate would likely not increase vaccine rates, which he believes already account for about 75% of the company’s roughly 75,000 employees. He said five to ten percent of employees likely have a medical or religious exception for a vaccine.

Voluntary vaccinations

The Atlanta-based airline announced to the Air Line Pilots Association last week of its intention to keep vaccines voluntary, according to a union memo.

“We understand that Covid vaccinations have become an emotional issue,” said the pilots union. “Although an overwhelming majority of the pilot group chose the Covid vaccine, please don’t let this issue become a distraction on the flight deck.”

JetBlue CEO Robin Hayes said the New York airline is “reviewing” a vaccination mandate and debating with unions and employees, but the company is “right now” strongly encouraging employees to get vaccinated.

“I think it’s better that people get vaccinated because they want to get vaccinated,” Hayes said in an interview last week. “I think once the US government [fully] approved [the vaccines]”I think that will bring a huge increase in the number of people being vaccinated.” Pfizer and Moderna both received conditional approval to distribute their vaccines in an emergency in December, pending full approval by the Food and Drug Administration. Pfizer’s Covid vaccine is expected to receive full approval in a few weeks.

The union that represents the JetBlue pilots said: “We are certainly all ready for the COVID-19 pandemic to come to an end, but there shouldn’t be any rash decisions that affect our pilots and their ability to make private medical decisions with theirs Meeting healthcare providers, potentially compromising consultation, “the Air Line Pilots Association’s JetBlue chapter wrote to members last week.

Frontier Airlines said its employees who refuse to be vaccinated would instead have to test regularly for Covid. United, on the other hand, said employees will be fired if they refuse to get the syringes, although there are exceptions for medical or religious reasons.

More incentives

Mike Klemm, president of the International Association of Machinists District 141, which, among other things, represents around 28,000 customer and ramp service employees at United, estimates that around a third of them are rejecting the mandate.

“That 35% is much louder than the 65%,” he said, adding that while United asked for a lawsuit against the company, it was “in their legal right.”

United is offering a day off for vaccinated workers, but Klemm said it should offer more.

“If they increased the incentive, more people would be attracted to get the vaccine,” he said. “I understand what the company is trying to do, but they should have just given incentives … instead of intimidating people.”

United CEO Scott Kirby told CNN last week that most of the feedback he has received from employees on the move has been positive.

“It’s a highly explosive decision,” said aeronautical advisor Mann. “One way or another, you invite criticism.”