THIRTY PERCENT OF HEALTH WORKERS UNVAXXED — Nearly a third of the nation’s health care workforce remained unvaccinated against the coronavirus as of mid-September, according to an analysis of CDC data publishing in the American Journal of Infection Control today. The data provides a picture of vaccination levels days after President Joe Biden laid out a vaccine mandate plan for federal employees and before some states and cities like New York City implemented requirements. But several providers had started to roll out mandates in the summer. “Our analysis revealed that vaccine coverage among U.S. hospital-based [health care providers] stalled significantly after initial uptake,” said Hannah Reses, a member of the CDC team that conducted the analysis and the paper’s lead author. Among data from more than 2,000 hospitals, researchers found that vaccination rates were highest among children’s hospitals (77 percent) followed closely by staff at short-term and long-term acute care sites. Workers in high-density cities were also more likely to get vaccinated than those in rural counties, at 71 percent and 63.3 percent, respectively. The journal is published by the Association for Professionals in Infection Control and Epidemiology, a group representing hospital workers who focus on preventing infections at hospitals. THE POLITICAL VAX DIVIDE IS REAL — Republicans in the U.S. are 26 percentage points more likely to be unvaccinated than Democrats, according to the Kaiser Family Foundation’s latest study, in what represents the latest evidence of a direct link from political affiliation to Covid-19 vaccination status. That’s a wider gap than the ones found between any of the following: different racial or ethnic groups, varying education levels, insured versus uninsured, rural versus urban or different age groups. And it signals that the vaccine resistance within the GOP will remain a chief obstacle to further suppressing the virus across the country. Overall, Republicans and Republican-leaning independents make up 60 percent of unvaccinated adults, KFF found. That’s despite representing just 41 percent of the total adult population. The GOP’s share of the unvaccinated has risen over time as well, meaning unvaccinated adults are now more than three times as likely to lean Republican than Democratic. Republicans are also more likely to downplay the Covid-19 threat — though even within the party, there’s a noticeable split based on vaccination status. Among the unvaccinated, nearly nine in 10 Republicans surveyed believe the virus’ seriousness is exaggerated. But just 54 percent of vaccinated Republicans believe the same. HOW BIDEN’S VAX RULE LEGAL FIGHT COULD BACKFIRE — The Biden administration’s vaccine-or-test mandate seems destined to land in front of the Supreme Court — where a conservative majority could use the opportunity to impose broad limits on the government’s policing of workplace safety, POLITICO’s Rebecca Rainey reports. The growing legal fight hinges on whether the Occupational Safety and Health Administration has the authority to make businesses require vaccination or regulate Covid-19 testing. While the White House has expressed confidence there’s clear precedent, those challenging the regulations say Congress never granted that power — and even if it did, it shouldn’t have. Biden’s bad news scenario: The Supreme Court could embrace that line of thinking and conclude OSHA’s authority is too vague, opening the door to a flood of challenges to regulations governing all sorts of workplace hazards. In particular, some businesses challenging the vaccine rule have argued it violates the “non-delegation doctrine” that says Congress can’t pass its legislative authority off to executive agencies. The Supreme Court hasn’t struck down a law based on that argument in decades — but the court’s conservative majority cited delegation concerns in an August ruling against Biden’s eviction moratorium. | 
