In a letter sent to Biden on Wednesday, Amazon (AMZN) Director Dave Clark wrote that the company “stands ready to help” vaccinate 100 million Americans in the first 100 days, as Biden has pledged to do.
As part of the offer, Clark pointed out that Amazon has more than 800,000 U.S.-based employees – most of whom work in critical roles in Amazon fulfillment centers, AWS data centers, and Whole Foods stores. Market – and these workers “should receive the Covid-19 vaccine as soon as possible.” He added that Amazon has an agreement with a licensed third-party occupational health care provider to administer vaccines at its facilities.
This is not the first time that Amazon has advocated for early access to the vaccine for its essential workers. In December, Clark wrote a letter to the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention’s Advisory Committee on Immunization Practices regarding access to the vaccine “as early as possible.” Others have made similar demands, including Uber for its drivers and the National Retail Federation, which has advocated for the retail industry.
The surge comes as worker safety became an area of intense surveillance during the pandemic for the company, whose operations exploded even as the economy as a whole was mired in a recession triggered by a pandemic. In October, Amazon said more than 19,000 of its frontline U.S. employees at Amazon and Whole Foods had tested positive or presumed positive for the coronavirus, highlighting for the first time how its workforce has been affected. by Covid-19 after months. pressure both internally and externally for greater transparency.
In Clark’s letter, he suggested the company can help the administration more broadly, although the details are unclear.
He wrote that Amazon is “ready to leverage our operations, information technology, communications capabilities and expertise to aid your administration’s immunization efforts. Our scale allows us to have a significant impact immediately in the fight against Covid-19, and we are ready to help. you in this effort. “
Amazon did not immediately respond to CNN Business’s request for more information.
