Lowcountry medical center mandates COVID-19 vaccines for staff: ‘We have to lead by example’
Beaufort Jasper Hampton Comprehensive Health Services has implemented a new COVID-19 vaccine mandate for employees.
The organization’s board of directors approved the policy in a vote late Thursday, said Dr. Faith Polkey, interim chief medical officer.
“We have to be on the front lines. We have to lead by example,” said Roland Gardner, CEO of BJHCHS, a federally qualified health center that treats underserved residents around the Lowcountry.
The policy, Polkey said, will protect staff members and patients.
“We have such a vulnerable patient population, with all types of comorbidities,” she said. “We wanted to ensure (there’s) a safe place for them to come.”
BJHCHS employees now have to receive a single-dose vaccine or the first dose of a two-dose vaccine by Sept. 13.
They must be fully vaccinated by Oct. 18.
“Failure to comply with this policy will result in an immediate suspension without pay and further disciplinary actions up to and including termination,” the policy states.
The mandate has medical and religious exemptions, though.
Those exempt from the requirement must be tested for COVID-19 once per week when there’s “significant” coronavirus spread in the community, according to Polkey and the policy. “The cost for the test is the responsibility of the employee,” the policy states.
Exempt, unvaccinated staff members also have to wear K-N95 or N-95 masks at work.
Vaccine mandates are becoming more common in health care settings across the United States, but such requirements are still controversial to many Americans.
There was no major pushback, however, against BJHCHS’ requirement, Gardner said.
Most of the organization’s roughly 300 employees were already inoculated before the policy was approved, Polkey said.
As of Friday morning, there were only about 45 vaccine holdouts, she said.
BJHCHS’ leadership has been discussing the need for a mandate over the past two weeks, Gardner said, amid a surge of local COVID-19 cases.
The super-contagious delta variant, which was discovered in India late last year, has been driving the recent uptick in coronavirus infections, exploiting South Carolina’s low vaccination rate, health officials say.
Beaufort County’s seven-day average of newly confirmed COVID-19 cases, for example, on Friday spiked to 141 infections per day, nearing a record high.
The county on Friday also shattered its single-day case record, with 235 confirmed infections.
Only 44.1% of Beaufort County’s population has been fully inoculated, according to the U.S. Census Bureau and S.C. Department of Health and Environmental Control.
“It was like a no-brainer for us,” Gardner said of his organization’s new vaccine mandate. “We had to do something.”
Note: Data in his story are current as of Friday afternoon.
This story was originally published August 22, 2021 at 7:30 AM.
