NEW YORK (AP) — New York City will soon require proof of COVID-19 vaccinations for anyone who wants to dine indoors at a restaurant, see a performance or go to the gym, Mayor Bill de Blasio announced Tuesday, making it the first big city in the U.S. to impose such restrictions.
The new requirement, which will be phased in over several weeks in August and September, is the most aggressive step the city has taken yet to curb a surge in cases caused by the delta variant. People will have to show proof that they have had at least one dose of a vaccine.
“The only way to patronize these establishments indoors will be if you’re vaccinated,” de Blasio said. “The goal here is to convince everyone that this is the time. If we’re going to stop the delta variant, the time is now. And that means getting vaccinated right now.”
The Democrat said some details still need to be worked out, including rules affecting children under 12, who are not yet eligible for any of the approved vaccines. The policy will go into effect on Aug. 16 but inspections and enforcement won’t begin until Sept. 13, the week that the city’s public schools reopen for the fall.
Vaccination cards will be accepted as proof of inoculation, along with state and city apps.
De Blasio has focused on getting as many New Yorkers vaccinated as possible while resisting calls to mandate masks indoors, as several cities and counties in California have done.
De Blasio said Monday he was making “a strong recommendation” that everyone wear a mask in public indoor settings but stressed that the city’s “overwhelming strategic thrust” remained getting more people vaccinated.
Asked Tuesday about a mask mandate, de Blasio said all options were on the table but reiterated that the city’s policy is “vaccine-centric.”
“Right now what we want to nail is people getting vaccinated, and, very bluntly, showing that life is much better when you’re vaccinated,” he added. “You can do so much more when you’re vaccinated. You have more freedom when you’re vaccinated, and you have a lot less, you have fewer choices, fewer opportunities if you’re not vaccinated.”
The mayor announced last week that city employees would be required to get vaccinated by mid-September or to face weekly testing, and he has offered a $100 incentive for city residents who get inoculated.
De Blasio said Tuesday that he did not think checking vaccination status should be too difficult for businesses, which already have to take tickets or show diners to a table.
Some restaurateurs disagreed.
Seongmin Jun, the manager of Dear Han Cafe, wondered how he would check vaccination cards while handling the periodic rush of patrons and serving as the cafe’s only barista.
“Will customers get offended for checking if they got COVID vaccinations? I mean I don’t know how to do that, or even if I will have time to do that,” Jun said.
The coffee shop opened just months before the pandemic spread early last year.
“They’re making it too hard for businesspeople,” Jun said, but acknowledged that something has to be done to get the outbreak under control. “I get what they are trying to say, but there must be another way to reduce the cases of COVID.”
Sean Ogs, manager of the nearby Woodside Cafe in Queens, said he was “floored” when he heard the news about the new vaccination mandate.
“We’ve already been in a struggle. I don’t know how I’m going to deal with it,” Ogs said. “It’s going to be extra work. It’ll make things impossible.”
Woodside Cafe customer Debbie McCarthy, who is unvaccinated, said she was turned away over the weekend from several establishments that had already begun requiring proof of vaccinations from patrons.
“I’m a little shocked they would do that,” said McCarthy, who said she recovered from COVID-19 a few months ago and believes her natural antibodies will protect from future infections. “Why are they so afraid of people who haven’t been vaccinated? I think we should have a choice.”
Scientists recommend vaccination for people who have had the virus, saying it’s unclear how long immunity without vaccination for those who have recovered would last.
Andrew Rigie, executive director of the NYC Hospitality Alliance, a restaurant group, said he supports the new policy.
“Mandating vaccine requirements for restaurant and bar employees and customers to work and dine indoors is a very difficult step, but ultimately may prove an essential move to protecting public health and ensuring that New York City does not revert to restrictions and shut down orders that would again absolutely devastate small businesses that have not yet recovered from the pandemic,” Rigie said in a statement.
Fitness studio owner Bill Zanker said he supports the newly announced policy as well, even though it comes as another hurdle after a long coronavirus shutdown.
“We’ve got to encourage people to get vaccinated. … We’re happy to enforce that,” said Zanker, the CEO of GRIT BXNG, a Manhattan studio that offers boxing-related workouts and a full bar. “Unfortunately, it will affect the business again.”
The studio had been open for just seven months before the pandemic shutdown began in March 2020. Since reopening this past May, GRIT has checked patrons’ vaccination status, offering some inoculated-only classes where people could go without masks, while unvaccinated people had to take other classes and cover their faces, he said. About 25% of the patrons are unvaccinated, he said.
Major performance venues including Broadway theaters and the Metropolitan Opera have already announced that vaccinations will be required for patrons.
About 66% of adults in New York City are fully vaccinated, according to official data.
On Monday, the U.S. reached President Joe Biden’s goal of getting at least one COVID-19 shot into 70% of American adults — a month late and amid a surge by the delta variant that is overwhelming hospitals and prompting renewed pandemic regulations around the country.
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Associated Press writer Jennifer Peltz contributed to this report.
© 2021 The Canadian Press. All rights reserved.
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This content is published through a licensing agreement with Acquire Media using its NewsEdge technology.
“is the most aggressive step the city has taken yet to curb a surge in cases caused by the delta variant”. Destroy more businesses in New York, de Blasio. The total destruction of society. Hey de Blasio, why aren’t you worried about the illegal aliens bringing the delta variant into our Country?
New York’s mayor only has this much power if The People are willing to grant it.
What next. GEstapo like, nazi uniform wearers outside, ASKING FOLKS “Vheerr are your PAPPERS!”
It’s the secuar Democrat prelude to the mark of the beast. Get your Democrat Party mark, or in this case papers, or you cannot engage in commerce or business of any kind. DeBlasi and the NY Democrats are dressed to the nines,,,,but its really the upside down 666.
I wonder. THERE are plenty of folk, who CAN’T get the vaccine.. SO WILL they effectively be barred from EVER going into any of these establishments??
And any vaccinated person sitting there could still become infectedm so what actual protection from the virus is this supposed to offer? Brains, please?
If mankind is supposed to be the crowning act of God’s Creation, then something has gone very wrong along the way. I think the animal kingdom has moved into first place.
Since the incoming illegal aliens are not required to show proof of vaccination before entering the USA to dine off the free social benefits ad infinitum at the taxpayer’s expense, can we at least ask for a proof of citizenship before letting them into the country? Not when the one world socialist/communists take over the government disguised as loyal Democrat Americans. The Whitehouse has become the modern day tower of Babel, which God destroyed because the Social criminals of that time sought to build their way into heaven and become gods themselves, but built their foundation on quicksand which today is the quick shifting sands of offered immediate gratification. He dispersed THE PEOPLE and confused their tongues so they could not collectively try it again. The one world high-tech babbling Biden men of today seek to repeat history with one world government, one world currency and one tongue to speak with,,,,,Biden’s one tongue being wagged by the many socialist elite who think they are gods themselves. God does not like such social collectives and prefers the up close and personal where individuals count more than parties. I pity the fools for what is coming their way. Better one nation under God than one party under Democrats.
Exactly. WHEN even vaccinated people are catching it, spreading it, and even in some cases, dying from it. HOW EXACTLY IS “Proof of the vaccine”, going to make things safe?
My answer to the .gov claims that ‘the vaccine works” is “Prove it!”
I don’t mean anecdotal claims or crunched numbers. Subtract all cases from across the southern border and nursing homes, all the other causes of death that were chocked up as “covid deaths”.
If masks work why do we need an experimental cocktail? If the cocktail works why do we need to mask up?
Not just that, but WHY DO THEY STILL contintually SILENCE scientists who are actually WORKING ON THE FRONT LINES of this, who have alternative ideas of what does/doesn’t work?
What happened to HIPAA compliancy?
I cannot even get results of tests for my teenage daughter who I pay her health benefits and now we have to show proof of medical procedures. What is wrong with that picture?
VEEE have no more need for Da Hippa laws.. You vill comply, Comrade!
More Like HIPPO compliance which is what you get when you cross a RINO with a PIG.
If new yorkers want to give up their freedoms, so be it. Stupid people will believe anything, even if there are facts that disprove it.
NY keeps proving JUST HOW FILLED with idiots, it is…
It is the fulfillment of Ben Franklin’s warning that “They who can give up essential liberty to obtain a little temporary safety deserve neither liberty nor safety.”
He obviously had Joe Biden types in mind when he stated “Many people die at twenty five and aren’t buried until they are seventy five”. ,,,and “Half a truth is often a great lie.” ,,,or “He who falls in love with himself will have no rivals.” And finally “Certainty? In this world nothing is certain but death and taxes. “,,,,as Joe and his party of COVID mongers certainly bring BOTH.
To Paraphrase Franklin “There are two ways for men or for nations to be happy: We must either diminish our wants or augment our means – either may do – the result is the same and it is for each man or each nation to decide for themselves and to do that which happens to be easier.” Democrat Socialists have not the wisdom or ability to do either which is what makes them and this nation truly so unhappy, by doing the opposite of increasing our wants, and diminishing our means.
PITY franklin and co, DIDN’T DO MORE to eradicate liberalism/democrat socialists, BACK THEN, when they were in their infancy, rather than letting them grow up to be the MONSTEROUS monolith they are now..
Our “leaders” are never going to allow this “pandemic ” to go away. They enjoy the power to make the citizens lives miserable, all of the while ignoring their own orders and laws!
Hi Billzilla. I think this whole “pandemic” is an excuse for gubment to suppress, repress, and ultimately control the citizens worldwide. It’s all about creating group of Yes people, whatever you say people. It’s about BIG, BIGGER, AND BIGGEST gubment. BYW, to the party that runs this forum, the Bold option did not work for me.
YOu can bet, they will AT LEAST keep it in place through out the time frame of the 2022 elections, and IF WE LET THEM, they’ll try to push it all the way to the 2024 elections.
As a native New Yorker, I will not visit until the lunacy ends. Don’t want to dodge drive bys in Time Square, avoid thugs in the subway and show papers to have my breakfast.
WHY do you still live in that cesspool of a state?!
Just don’t go to NYC for anything. Then no vaccine passport needed. If enough people said “No” things would quickly change. The free market prevails. It’s called capitalism.
JUST DON’T go to New york as a whole, not just NYC…
It is federally illegal to force or coheres someone to take an EXPERMENTAL DRUG. All the vaccines are experimental. “Federal law 21 U.S.C. § 360bbb-3(e)(1)(A)(ii)(III) requires that the person to whom an EUA vaccine is administered be advised, ‘of the option to accept or refuse administration of the product, of the consequences, if any, of refusing administration of the product, and of the alternatives to the product that are available and of their benefits and risks.’”
The reason for the right of refusal stems from the fact that EUA products are by definition experimental, Kennedy wrote. “Under the Nuremberg Code, no one may be coerced to participate in a medical experiment. Consent of the individual is ‘absolutely essential,’” (CHD) Chairman Robert F. Kennedy, Jr. wrote.
TELL that, to all these governors/politicians, and managers/bosses at all these companies, MANDATING folks get it, or get pink slipped..
I’m waiting for the first case (and maybe it has already been filed but the mainstream media is hiding it) of someone forced to get the jab (no jab, no job) and getting seriously ill suing their employer. Or, a family member because the person forced has died. THAT might get the attention of these businesses, cities, states, etc. if THEY have full liability for forcing a person to get it.
In the meantime, I’ll just not go to any establishment or city where I am not allowed to go about my business. There is plenty of proof that the vaccine isn’t stopping people who have it from getting sick nor is it keeping them from carrying a viral load equal to an unvaccinated person who is sick. So, there is obviously some other reason that the vaccine is being pushed. I’m not a conspiracy theorist but something doesn’t make sense with what is going on right now.
Knowing how borked our court system has gotten, any such lawsuit will likely be tossed on “The plantiff has no standing to sue”.
I happen to be vaccinated. Having said that I am not showing my vaccination papers to anyone. Also there is no way I would let my under 18 child get the vaccine. Further I told my 26 year old daughter not to get it until she’s past her child bearing years. There is no way they know the long term effects of this experimental vaccine. I’m also done with masks. If a business insists on masks or vaccine I’m taking my business elsewhere.
Jun said, “…that something has to be done to get the outbreak under control.“
Nothing they have done so far has accomplished this. What makes anyone think this will. My suggestion, learn to live with it.
“Scientists recommend vaccination for people who have had the virus, saying it’s unclear how long immunity without vaccination for those who have recovered would last.”
This virus started around January 2020, maybe sooner and millions have recovered. Can anyone tell me why they still don’t know how long natural immunity lasts? You would think that they would at least be able to tell us if people who got it early were still immune. But I guess that information isn’t good for the vaccine manufacturers.
Forgot to ask… Aren’t the same people who say it’s racist to show an ID to vote now demanding we show vaccination papers to live our lives?
Maybe they don’t know, BECAUSE THEY HAVE NOT BOTHERED looking into it, AS TO DO SO, would put paid to demanding millions of folks, take an EXPERIMENTAL VACCINE…
But . .but . .during the 2020 campaign, Kamela Harris, Joe Biden, Nancy Pelosi , Chuck Schumer all said they would NEVER trust a covid vaccine developed under Donald Trump. Apparently millions of people remember that.
BUT we must believe THEM, rather than our “Lying eyes and ears”.