“While we are making progress with 75% of staff received or are willing to receive their booster, the reality is that not enough healthcare workers will be boosted by next week’s requirement in order to avoid substantial staffing issues in our already overstressed healthcare system,” Bassett said in a statement.
Bassett said state health officials will take another look at the booster mandate in three months to decide whether New York should take more steps to increase booster rates.
Utah officials on Friday announced the state's plan no longer to treat COVID-19 like a pandemic and instead view it like other seasonal diseases.
Gov. Spencer Cox said the "steady state" model will begin March 31 by phasing out mass testing sites and less frequently reporting COVID-19 case counts. Cox said at-home tests, antiviral treatment and wastewater surveillance will help keep Utah cases and hospitalizations at manageable levels and monitor for new spikes, variants and outbreaks.
“Now, let me be clear, this is not the end of COVID, but it is the end — or rather the beginning — of treating COVID as we do other seasonal respiratory viruses,” Cox said.
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