“They’re going to have to weigh the risk and benefit there.” “They’re going to have to think twice about it,” Warrell said. A potential vaccine mandate further endangers their staffing numbers, she said. She pointed out that some regional health care systems don’t qualify for staffing assistance from the National Guard as they have fewer than 200 beds. It all comes back to workforce shortages, especially in more vaccine-hesitant communities, said Jacy Warrell, executive director of the Rural Health Association of Tennessee. In Nebraska, the state veterans affairs’ agency prominently displays the lack of a vaccine requirement for nurses on its job site, The Associated Press reported. 15, according to the Rural Policy Research Institute.ĭespite the scientific knowledge that covid vaccinations sharply lower the risk of infection, hospitalization and death, the lack of a vaccine mandate can serve as a hospital recruiting tool. Rural covid mortality rates were almost 70% higher on average than urban ones for the week ending Aug. But the surge could also squeeze the hospital workforce further as patients flood in and staffers take sick days. In the short term, mandates might drive away some workers. Without vaccine mandates, this could lead to a desperate cycle: Areas with fewer vaccinated residents likely have fewer vaccinated hospital workers, too, making them more likely to be hard hit by the delta variant sweeping America. Subscribe to KHN's free Morning Briefing. “Obviously, it’s going to be a real challenge for these small, rural hospitals to mandate a vaccine when they’re already facing such significant workforce shortages,” said Alan Morgan, head of the National Rural Health Association. While urban hospitals with deeper pockets for shoring up staff have implemented vaccine mandates, and may even use them as a selling point to recruit staffers and patients, their rural and regional counterparts are left with hard choices as cases surge again. The market for health care labor, strained by more than a year and a half of coping with the pandemic, continues to be pinched. Across Missouri and the nation, hospitals are weighing more than patient and caregiver health in deciding whether to mandate covid vaccines for staffers. hospitals had announced vaccine mandates, said Colin Milligan, a spokesperson for the American Hospital Association. “Maybe that’s the thing that will keep nurses here.”Īs of Thursday, about 39% of U.S. “If that becomes our differential advantage, we probably won’t have one until we’re forced to have one,” Tobler said. Even as covid cases rise, though, a vaccine mandate is out of the question. And the prices are steep - what he called “crazy” rates of $200 an hour or more, which Tobler said his small rural hospital cannot afford.Ī little over 60% of his staff is fully vaccinated. Randy Tobler has hired more travel nurses to fill the gaps. The national covid staffing crunch means CEO Dr.
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