UC to require COVID-19 vaccines from students for fall term

The University of California announced Thursday that COVID-19 vaccines will be required before the start of the fall term for all students, faculty and others, becoming the largest public university system in the country to mandate vaccines even though they are do not have full federal approval.

As the highly contagious Delta variant spreads amid lower vaccination rates among young people, unvaccinated students without approved exemptions will be excluded from in-person classes, events, and campus facilities, including housing – and all. the courses will not be offered online, a note from UC outlining the terms of reference. Physical distancing and mask wearing should continue.

“Vaccination is by far the most effective way to prevent serious illness and death after exposure to the virus and to reduce the spread of the disease to those who are not able, or not yet eligible, to receive the vaccine.” UC President Michael V. Drake said in a letter to the 10 chancellors of the system.

He said the final policy was the product of consultation with infectious disease experts at UC and an ongoing review of evidence from medical studies on the dangers of COVID-19 and emerging variants. UC officials have also assessed the safety and effectiveness of vaccines in preventing infections, hospitalizations and deaths from COVID-19, and in reducing its spread.

California State University is still in the process of defining its requirements and currently plans to mandate vaccinations only after the U.S. Food and Drug Administration gives full approval to at least one of the vaccines. The Los Angeles Community College District is also encouraging, but does not require vaccinations for students, faculty, and staff.

The differing policies between three California public higher education systems, which collectively educate more than one million students, underscore the lingering uncertainty about campus health and safety protocols at colleges across the country. In addition, questions remain as to whether public educational institutions have the legal right to require vaccine inoculations that have not received full federal approval.

Debate has raged in higher education nationwide as campuses take different positions on these legal issues and some students have taken legal action against them. More than 580 institutions have announced terms, according to a Chronicle of Higher Education tracker, including more than 60 in California, such as USC, Caltech, Stanford, Occidental, Chapman, Pepperdine and Claremont Colleges.

But UC is one of the few public university systems to announce that it will impose the mandate even if vaccines remain under emergency use authorization. The UC had previously announced that it would only require vaccinations after the vaccines received full FDA approval. But after further medical studies documented the safety and effectiveness of vaccines, and UC faculty, staff, and students expressed strong support, UC moved forward with this demand.

Exemptions and narrow exceptions will be allowed on the basis of medical, religious and disability grounds, as well as postponements due to pregnancy. Proof of vaccination or exemption requests must be submitted no later than two weeks before the first teaching day in the fall. UC Berkeley and UC Merced start the fall semester in August while the other campuses are on quarter systems and start in September.

But legal questions remain. In New York City, for example, Gov. Andrew Cuomo said warrants must await full FDA approval, a position taken by both state and city university systems. The Los Angeles Community College District came to a similar conclusion.

“You cannot legally force people to take an ’emergency vaccine’, which is why there are no laws passed at the federal or state level to mandate COVID-19 vaccines,” said William Boyer. , the spokesperson for the district.

UC officials say they believe they have the right to impose a warrant.

“The University has always believed and still believes that it is legally permissible to impose a warrant upon emergency use authorization, and the Commission for Equal Employment Opportunities has also issued guidelines that employers can require their employees to be vaccinated against COVID-19 (subject to certain exceptions) as a condition of physical access, ”a statement from UC said. “The most important consideration is that people are immunized to support public health and the safety of our communities. “

Some argue that students are free to refuse vaccinations – although under UC policy they would then be prohibited from entering campus facilities, including housing and classrooms, to unless they have approved exemptions.

A vaccine warrant under an emergency use authorization could also be considered to infringe an individual’s federal right to refuse, if the educational benefits or employment rights in would be affected, and could lead to litigation alleging institutions facilitate illegal human experimentation, counsel by Mark LeForestier, general counsel for California Community Colleges.

The Republicans at California College, for example, are “an activity exploring legal options,” a spokesperson said. The group’s executive committee and the California Federation of College Republicans have condemned mandatory vaccinations without full FDA approval. “We are committed to ensuring that students are not required to take experimental vaccines in order to continue their education,” said Dylan Martin, group spokesperson and UC San Diego graduate.

Three Cal State Chico students have sued the CSU system, arguing that a possible vaccination warrant would violate their constitutional rights to liberty by depriving them of “bodily autonomy” to refuse a vaccine they consider dangerous.

In a statement, CSU said any future decisions regarding terms would be made “in the best interests of our campus communities and help protect students, faculty, staff and their families.”

At least two unions of UC employees argue that UC does not have the right to impose the mandate without a negotiated agreement on immunization policy.

The American Council on Education, which represents more than 1,700 colleges and universities, released a brief in March saying courts would likely uphold the right of institutions to require COVID-19 vaccines in accordance with existing immunization requirements. influenza. Last year, a California court refused to suspend UC’s flu shot mandate, saying a long list of previous cases had confirmed those demands.

Dorit Rubinstein Reiss, professor at UC Hastings College of the Law, noted that students can refuse vaccination and universities are not obligated to accommodate them because higher education is not a right, unlike the teaching K-12.

“It is the job of the university to provide a safe campus and a vaccination mandate will increase the safety of the campus,” she said. “That’s what you should do.”

UC Student Assn. and the UC Academic Senate strongly support a vaccine requirement. Members of the Academic Senate want a strong policy that clearly prohibits unvaccinated people from entering campus and declares UC professors will not be required to accommodate them with special distance education, regardless of whether they have an exemption or not, wrote Senate Speaker Mary Gauvain in a May 28 letter to UC Vice-President Susan Carlson.

Students will be required to enter vaccination dates and upload an image of their COVID-19 vaccination card through their student health service portals. UC staff will review and verify the information, the note said.

At Cal State, students, faculty, and staff may be able to self-certify that they are vaccinated before the fall semester, but the university is still finalizing a policy, which will also include medical and religious exemptions and will be negotiated with various unions.

“Speaking to union and student leaders, I think we fully agree to work together to make sure everyone who comes to campus is safe,” CSU Chancellor Joseph I. Castro said, at the Times.

Chancellor Francisco Rodriguez of the Los Angeles Community College District recently reiterated to administrators that staff have looked at the issue of immunization and recommended “not to mandate but to encourage, facilitate and incite – and we do. effectively “.

Last fall, California colleges and universities scrambled to prevent potential outbreaks as campuses reopened as COVID-19 cases increased statewide. Cases are rising again as campuses prepare to open for the fall term with in-person classes, full dorms and a return to normal college life.

The number of unvaccinated youth is a concern in California and across the country. In Los Angeles County, health officials said on Saturday that 83% of the 1,094 new cases reported were in people under the age of 50. Residents between the ages of 18 and 49 account for 70% of these cases.

State health officials could not immediately say how many people between the ages of 18 and 22 were vaccinated. But campus incentive programs targeting students for vaccination have been launched statewide. The growing need even prompted the Biden administration to turn to 18-year-old singer and actress Olivia Rodrigo to help urge younger people to get vaccinated through its social media platforms.

Students are also threatened by the spread of community around their campuses, UC San Francisco epidemiologist Dr George Rutherford said. Suburban schools, where students come and go, may be at greater risk of the spread than residential campuses where the community is more planted.

“If a significant number are unvaccinated or unimmunized, like 15%, then we’re going to be in trouble. If the vaccination rates are higher than that, then I think you’ll be fine, ”Rutherford said.