CDC Director Punctures Chicago Teacher Union Claims, Says Vaccinations ‘Not a Prerequisite’ to Safely Reopen Schools
“There is increasing data to suggest that schools can safely reopen and that safe reopening does not suggest that teachers need to be vaccinated.”
Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) Director Rochelle Walensky said that schools are safe even if the teachers are not vaccinated.
Walensky’s announcement puts a dent in the Chicago Teachers Union (CTU) argument to not return to the classroom.
From CNBC:
“There is increasing data to suggest that schools can safely reopen and that safe reopening does not suggest that teachers need to be vaccinated,” CDC Director Rochelle Walensky told reporters during a White House press briefing on Covid-19.
“Vaccinations of teachers is not a prerequisite for safely reopening schools,” she added.
.@CDCDirector Rochelle Walensky says vaccinating teachers is not a prerequisite for safe reopening of schools. pic.twitter.com/bL7Brg0HI8
— Greg Tomlin ? (@TomlinMedia) February 3, 2021
The CDC already pushed teachers towards the front of the vaccine line. They are only behind the elderly and health care workers.
The CTU has successfully pushed reopening schools until, hopefully, this week.
Preschool and special education students went back to class on January 11. But the CTU’s hissy fit moved them back to remote learning. They did this even though special education students probably need in-person instruction more than anyone.
The CTU and Chicago Public Schools (CPS) are currently in a two-day “cooling off” period.
They agreed on these points: temperature checks, mandatory masks, HEPA air purifiers, health screenings, and social distancing.
But the CTU is adamant that CPS allows teachers to stay home until they have the vaccine. Chicago moved teachers into Phase 1b, but officials stressed they do not have enough vaccines.
CTU wants a resolution of the accommodation requests rejected by CPS. Teachers made these requests because either they or family members have compromised immune systems:
Deanna Myron, a clerk at Curie Metro High School, said she requested an accommodation ahead of an initial August return date on behalf of her immune-compromised fiance, who had just finished radiation treatment for liver cancer. The request was denied, Myron said at a Friday union news conference.
CPS has already threatened to lockout teachers. CTU has already threatened a strike.
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Comments
For over half of a year, we’ve all been told that COVID-19 is antother Black Death, or something like it. We’ve seen Gov. Cuomo thin out the nursing home population of NY. We’ve had a lot of absolute numbers thrown at us, reported in ominous tones by our MSM. Pres. Trump was blamed for several hundred COV-19 deaths (but, oddly enough, not for the cancer and heart attack deaths that occurred on his watch).
Add to this, any teacher can tell your that schools are germ factories. Colds, flu, you name it sweep through student bodies and staffs yearly–althuogh most do little more than keep a person bedridden and close to a toilet for few days. So, after the roller coaster of claims and fear, can you truly blame the teachers?
Speaking as a High School teacher myself, I’m old, and teach thiry kids in a room designed for twenty. Part of me, seeing the difficulty of teaching remotely, is willing to take the risk of going back. But, I can understand the worries of many more in my profession.
Teachers, like doctors, tend to have well-tested immunity due to their exposures. A broad “will not go” pout move by the unions is just a power play (while making no concessions on compensation of course). You can always carve out exceptions for those that have risk tiers. That’s what’s been done at the collegiate level.
I’m sorry but the unions and their denizens can’t have it both ways. Either the profession is so important and essential that the teacher must be there if at all possible, or it isn’t. I do think it is important, which is why the unions are playing a poor game of sleight of hand that most are smart enough to catch onto. If they aren’t that essential after all, why is Chicago overpaying them so much? (Chicago STARTS in the mid 50k range and older teachers make 6 figures). These are for 9 month contracts! By the way, the union wants to raise this pay rate even more while in the midst of a pandemic! That’s gall!
For a year we were all going to die. Nothing has changed. But, all of a sudden people are just supposed to get over it?
They owe us an explanation.
The explanation is that they’ve been lying to us and some people were stupid enough to believe them.
Chicago teachers have more to fear from their students than any virus.
Yes, I can. Unlike the flu, which apparently no longer exists, children don’t spread covid. So what are the teachers afraid of?
Working for their pay?
Maybe it won’t be for future years, but the first year of teaching online is far more work than classroom teaching.
Why the downvotes? That is inarguably true.
I’ m.old I work with special needs children as my post retirement job .We have been working since August .The children ,for the most part wear no masks.
The science has been clear on this children are an insignificant transmission risk.
Schools in Europe have been open since April and May and many schools have been open since Sept in the US.
The Democommunist Media have overblown.Covid into the stratosphere and the states and hospitals are taking the Federal Government for a gravy train ride to pilfer subsidies
Open the Schools now.
Unions aren’t beholden to pesky things like facts.
Meh. They’ll just have a brand new objection tomorrow that somebody will have to knock down. Like the Maricopa County election czarina.
Who is less trustworthy, the CDC, any teacher’s union in America Or Alexandra Smoellet?
It’s a tie.
Stop paying teachers who are not willing to return, if they don’t have any risk factors, then they return or are replaced. Sweeten punishment by clawing back funds paid while they were not working.
There was a time when I carried employees througth winter, that ended when one I had carried left for another job when I needed him.
Some employers abuse employees, and quite high numbers of employees do not deliver fair value. It often takes months to find out rather an employee should be retained, and then one has to start over.
I support the CTU in this this fight, although not for the reasons they might imagine. With the possible exception of the Joseph Goebbels media and Hollywood, no institution in the US is more responsible for America’s slide into the hellhole of Communist dictatorship than public education. Educrats have not merely failed to do their jobs and properly educate our children; they have the blood of uncounted thousands on their hands because of their lies and hate.
So if the CTU and other teachers’ unions end up destroying public education by driving parents to private schools and homeschooling, it would be a greater service than anything they have done in their miserable professional lives. No more of the genocidal racist claptrap like the “1619 Project” and Critical Race Theory. No more pseudoscience like global warming cultism. No more billions for an education system that seems proficient only in destroying students’ ability to reason and turning them into mindless lefty brownshirts out to lynch anyone who does not agree with them chapter and verse.
Let the CTU burn the public education system to the ground. I will even help supply the gasoline and matches.
this. so. much. this.
This falls under the rubric of “blue-cities self-destructing,” about which my standard policy is to see if the pantry has any popcorn left.
It doesn’t count unless Dr Fauci says it! (/sarc)
If they won’t return to work, fire the SOBs, today.
This is Lightfoot’s crisis and she’s letting it go to waste. Fire any teacher that doesn’t show up on Friday. No excuses, no exceptions. Hire replacements and tell fired teachers they have to reapply if they wish to return and if they are rehired they go to the bottom of the seniority list.
The only good Lightfoot is a Gordon Lightfoot.