Joe Biden announced new vaccine mandates that will cover 100 million Americans

The new requirements could apply to as many as 100 million Americans – on the brink of two-thirds of the American workforce – and amount to Biden’s strongest push yet to need vaccines for much of the country.

“We’ve been patient, but our patience is wearing thin, and your refusal has cost all folks,” Biden said, his tone hardening toward Americans who still refuse to receive a vaccine despite ample evidence of their safety and full approval of 1 — the Pfizer-BioNTech Covid-19 vaccine — from the US Food and Drug Administration.

He said vaccinated America was growing “frustrated” with the 80 million people that haven’t received shots and are fueling the spread of the virus. And he acknowledged the new steps wouldn’t provide a fast fix.

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“While America is in far better shape than it had been seven months ago once I took office, I want to inform you a second fact: We’re during a tough stretch and it could last for a while,” Biden said in an early evening speech from the White House.

In the middle of Biden’s new plan is directing the Department of Labor to need all businesses with 100 or more employees to ensure their workers are either vaccinated or tested once every week, an expansive step the President took after consultation with administration health officials and lawyers. Companies could face thousands of dollars in fines per employee if they do not comply.

US mail workers would fall into that rule, a senior administration official told CNN, and employees are going to be required to be vaccinated or face mandatory weekly testing. The mail, a quasi agency, employs quite 640,000 people.

Biden also signed an executive order requiring all government employees to be vaccinated against Covid-19, with no option of being regularly tested to cop-out. The President signed an accompanying order directing an equivalent standard be applied to employees of contractors who do business with the federal.

He said 300,000 educators in federal start programs must be vaccinated and called on governors to need vaccinations for schoolteachers and staff.

And Biden announced he would require the 17 million health care workers at facilities receiving funds from Medicare and Medicaid to be fully vaccinated, expanding the mandate to hospitals, home care facilities, and dialysis centers around the country.

“We have the tools to combat the virus if we close to use those tools,” Biden said at the outset of what was billed as a serious speech to tackle the newest phase of the Covid-19 pandemic.

The new rules amount to the foremost dramatic steps so far to urge more Americans vaccinated. Once cautious of vaccine mandates, the Biden administration is now wholly embracing them as vaccine hesitancy persists among certain groups.

Administration officials acknowledged the need for giant employers might be challenged in court. But they said their hope was to supply cover of federal rules to businesses who want to need vaccines for workers.

The new rules come because the Delta variant tears through communities across the country, causing upticks in hospitalizations and deaths particularly in areas where vaccination rates remain low