LA council members propose proof of Covid vaccination in indoor spaces
In cities and counties where there has been ongoing debate around mask mandates in public schools, several local health officials have reported again being intimidated by or receiving threats from anti-maskers, Lori Tremmel Freeman, chief executive officer of the National Association of County and City Health Officials, told CNN on Wednesday.
This is something NACCHO is now monitoring closely.
As a return to school gets underway, “these are heated conversations sometimes that are turning nasty and out of control,” Freeman said. “We are going to see more of this in communities that have these high transmission rates and are returning to some of these mitigation efforts. We’re going to have to track it closely.”
Throughout the pandemic, public health officers have reported receiving death threats and harassment in response to their recommendations to wear masks and follow certain Covid-19 mitigation measures. For instance, Dr. Anthony Fauci, director of the National Institute of Allergy and Infectious Diseases, has spoken openly about receiving death threats.
CNN previously reported that during a live public briefing on Facebook last year, “someone very casually suggested” Los Angeles County’s public health director, Barbara Ferrer, should be shot. And in Washington state, Okanogan County community health director Lauri Jones installed a new security system and asked for police patrols around her home following repeated online threats.
“Just last week, we started seeing extremist groups come out again in opposition to their public health officers’ orders in California,” Freeman said on Wednesday. “Another example, in North Carolina, involved school board meetings where parents were picketing that there was no way they were sending their kids to school in masks. Really, this is going on in different places across the country.”
The US Centers for Disease Control and Prevention updated its guidance on masks last week, recommending that everyone older than age 2 wear masks in schools, whether vaccinated or not.
“We’re hearing a lot of challenges on the ground, especially in states choosing not to take up the mask mandates that were recommended last week and opting to instead push decisions on masking down locally,” Freeman said. “When the state doesn’t want to take a hard line, it naturally falls to community-level decisions and so we’re back to local health departments being front and center of controversy around the reintroduction of masks for vaccinated people.”
These pressures of the pandemic seem to be taking a toll on the public health workforce.
Freeman previously told CNN in May that NACCHO has tracked more than 250 public health officials leaving the field since the beginning of the pandemic.
