Boise’s big hospitals require COVID-19 vaccine for workers. What are other providers doing?
Saint Alphonsus Health System will require all employees to be vaccinated against COVID-19 come September, the hospital announced Thursday.
Multiple other heath providers in the state quickly followed suit.
The region’s other biggest hospital, St. Luke’s Health System, made a similar announcement Thursday afternoon, and will require its team members — including volunteers and students — to have received at least one dose of a vaccine by Sept. 1.
And Primary Health Medical Group, a major provider in the Treasure Valley, said Thursday that it is requiring its workers to be fully vaccinated by Sept. 9.
The decisions come at a time when vaccination rates in Idaho are among the lowest in the nation. Forty-seven states have higher vaccination rates than the Gem State, according to the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention.
In a letter to staff, Primary Health CEO David Peterman stressed the safety of vaccines and the need to keep the company’s 21 clinics open throughout the year.
“We understand the enormity of this decision and are putting the mandate in place based on the current medical information, which has overwhelmingly shown the effectiveness of the vaccines and the rare occurrence of very few serious side effects,” he said. “We cannot go through another year like last where 30% of our employees at times were out with illness and clinics had to be closed. We need to be available for our patients.”
Peterman said the provider will allow medical and religious exemptions to getting the vaccine, as it does for its list of other required immunizations. Seventy-eight percent of the provider’s employees are already fully vaccinated, according to spokesperson Chryssa Rich.
West Valley Medical Center, a hospital in Caldwell, is not requiring that its employees be vaccinated, according to Brittany Glas, a spokesperson for HCA Healthcare, which operates the facility.
“We are very interested in having people get vaccinated for flu, but we also don’t require flu (vaccinations) at this point in time, but do require employees to be masked if they have not been vaccinated for flu,” Mike Baumann, chief medical officer for HCA’s Mountain Division, which includes its Idaho hospitals, said at a press conference on Wednesday in Utah.
Saltzer Health and Terry Reilly Health Services, two other large area providers, did not immediately respond to questions about vaccine requirements.
This story was originally published July 8, 2021 at 6:07 PM.
