Gov. Gavin Newsom on Wednesday is expected to announce a possible vaccine order for teachers and staff at all California public schools as COVID-19 cases continue to spike across the state and nation.
The governor will mandate that all California public school employees either be vaccinated against COVID-19 or submit to a regular test proving they are not infected with the coronavirus, according to a report from the Los Angeles Times.
Newsom is scheduled to visit an elementary school in Alameda County to unveil the plan. He already has issued a similar mandate for employees of state agencies as well as for state medical workers, with some religious and health exemptions.
Some Bay Area school districts already have announced vaccine mandates for teachers and staff, including San Francisco and Oakland just this week.
Several school districts are resuming in-person learning this week, including Palo Alto Unified, Pleasanton Unified, Sequoia Union, Mountain View and South San Francisco Unified.
As the school year starts, with most students returning to in-person learning, concerns grow about the possibility of the highly transmissible COVID-19 delta variant. In East Contra Costa County, districts in Brentwood and Oakley reopened last week and saw a spike in cases among students and staff.
The outbreak in the Brentwood Union School District grew from 10 confirmed cases to 19 as of Tuesday, and at least 117 students and four staffers there were “showing symptoms” of COVID-19 but had not yet tested positive.
Source: NBC Bay Area