Dozens of health care clinics in Oregon lost workers because of the COVID-19 vaccine mandate imposed by the state’s health agency, according to a new study.
About half of clinics that filled out surveys reported losing workers. The majority of those reporting the loss of employees are in rural areas.
“Oregon’s COVID-19 vaccination mandate increased health care personnel vaccination rates, yet amplified staffing challenges with disproportionate impacts in rural areas,” Dr. Brigit Hatch, a professor at Oregon Health & Science University, and her co-workers said.
Oregon Gov. Tina Kotek, a Democrat, and the Oregon Health Authority didn’t respond to requests for comment.
Former Oregon Gov. Kate Brown, a Democrat, announced the mandate in 2021. In August 2021, she announced that a testing alternative would no longer be in place, as of Oct. 18, 2021.
Brown claimed that forcing workers to get vaccinated would help ensure there were enough workers to treat patients.
The vaccines never prevented infection or transmission and data at the time showed that the protection bestowed by the vaccines was waning over time, soon prompting federal authorities to authorize boosters.
The mandate was imposed by the Oregon Health Authority even as the agency acknowledged that vaccinated people couldn’t only get infected, but had similar viral loads, or amounts of COVID-19, to unvaccinated people.
“The Delta variant is causing a surge in unvaccinated cases and vaccine breakthrough cases. This rule is necessary to help control COVID-19, protect patients, and to protect the state’s health care workforce,” the authority said at the time.
The rule was suspended in May 2023.
“OAR 333-019-1010 is now being suspended, because immunity from the primary series is known to wane over time, such that 2 booster vaccinations have since been recommended for most persons. Moreover, the virus that causes COVID-19 has mutated such that the original series provides little long-term protection against infection by currently circulating strains. Finally, at this point most people have been infected by the virus (94% by one estimate), giving survivors a degree of immunity at least equivalent to that provided by the original vaccination series for some period of time,” the agency said at the time.
The rule was repealed in June 2023.
