Hoyer says call with Biden officials concerning vax mandate flexibility ‘productive’

CHARLESTON, W.Va. — State Coronavirus InterAgency Task Force Director Jim Hoyer expects additional conversations with the Biden administration concerning flexibility with vaccination mandates for rural hospital workers.

James Hoyer

Hoyer, Gov. Jim Justice’s Chief of Staff Brian Abraham and state DHHR Secretary Bill Crouch, took part in a phone call Thursday with White House officials and representatives of the Virginia governor’s office.

“We both characterized it as a productive discussion on giving governors with particularly rural challenges flexibility,” Hoyer said. “Continued discussions will go forward.”

There’s currently a vaccination mandate deadline of Feb. 28 for workers at health care facilities that receive Medicaid and Medicare funding. Gov. Justice said earlier this week he would be asking for a waiver fo rural hospitals because of staffing problems. Hoyer said Thursday the request is for flexibility not a total waiver of the mandate.

“We’re more looking at the time of implementation of those requirements, to give us time to work through this latest surge and get off the peak,” Hoyer said Thursday on MetroNews “Talkline.”

West Virginia and Virginia representatives both said during Thursday’s call that parts of their states tend to lag behind the rest of the country when it comes to reaching peaks in number of cases and hospitalizations. Hoyer said moving the Feb. 28 mandate deadline would help with current staffing issues in rural hospitals.

“We tend to be two to three weeks behind these surges as they come across the country,” he said.

There remained more than 1,000 people hospitalized with COVID-19 Thursday, according to the state DHHR covid dashboard. There are currently 275 members of the West Virginia National Guard helping out in 34 hospitals in the state.

Hoyer said he expects further discussions with the Biden administration and Virginia on the flexibility issue.

“I think we’re going to look together cooperatively at figuring out how to get to some flexibility for our governors to be able to get past the surge,” Hoyer said.

Gov. Justice is expected to address the issue at his Friday coronavirus media briefing.





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