WASHINGTON, DC – Unvaccinated Americans are a growing public health problem according to U.S. President Joe Biden who this week declared, “The unvaccinated are a risk to all of us”.
“The fact is, this has been a pandemic of the unvaccinated. Unvaccinated. The unvaccinated overcrowded our hospitals, overrunning emergency rooms and intensive care units. The unvaccinated patients are — are leaving no room for someone with a heart attack or in need of a cancer operation and so much more because they can’t into the ICU. They can’t get into the operating rooms,” Biden said.
Biden went on to blame the unvaccinated for people not wanting to go out to restaurants and movie theaters, causing economic distress.
“The unvaccinated also put our economy at risk because people are reluctant to go out. And think about this: Even in places where there is no restriction on going to restaurants and gyms and movie theaters, people are not going in anywhere near the numbers because they’re worried they’re going to get sick,” Biden added.
In a press conference in a studio set across from the White House, due to COVID-19 restrictions, Biden said the unvaccinated put us all at risk.
“Please get vaccinated now, it works, it’s free and it has never been more important,” he concluded.
On Thursday, Biden said the following:
I’ve tried everything in my power to get people vaccinated. First thing I did when I was sworn into office back on January 20th is I bought enough vaccine — right off the bat — to vaccinate every single American. There were only 4 million Americans who had been vaccinated up to that point, even though the virus had been around.
Second, we made everyone eligible to get a vaccination and made it easy and convenient for them to find a place to get vaccinated — over 80,000 places around the country.
Third, we gave everyone ample time and information to deal with their concerns. We developed hundreds of million — we’d — millions of dollars in incentives — you did here in the city and the state of — of Illinois — and cities and community organizations to encourage vaccinations. Governor Pritzer — Pritzker, you’ve done one hell of a job, in terms of encouraging people before we even get to the mandate.
But even after all those efforts, we still had more than a quarter of people in the United States who were eligible for vaccinations but didn’t get the shot.
And we know there is no other way to beat the pandemic than to get the vast majority of Americans vaccinated. It’s as simple as that.
And to — to spread to our children, to spread throughout society and at our hospitals the risk of other variants — it’s all dangerous and obvious, but we’re still not there.
We have to beat this thing. So, while I didn’t race to do it right away, that’s why I’ve had to move toward requirements that everyone get vaccinated or I had the authority to do that. That wasn’t my first instinct.
My administration is now requiring federal workers to be vaccinated. We’ve also required federal contractors to be vaccinated. If you have a contract with the federal government, working for the federal government, you have to be vaccinated.
We’re requiring active duty military to be vaccinated. We’re making sure healthcare workers are vaccinated, because if you seek care at a healthcare facility, you should have the certainty that the pro- — the people providing that care are protected from COVID and cannot spread it to you.
The Labor Department is going to shortly issue an emergency rule — which I asked for several weeks ago, and they’re going through the process — to require all employees [employers] with more than 100 people, whether they work for the federal government or not — this is within a — in the purview of the Labor Department — to ensure their workers are fully vaccinated or face testing at least once a week.
In total, this Labor Department vaccination requirement will cover 100 million Americans, about two thirds of all the people who work in America.