SACRAMENTO— To help protect its patients, workforce and communities from the highly contagious COVID-19 delta variant, not-for-profit Sutter Health today announced a new policy requiring its workforce to be fully vaccinated against COVID-19 by Sept. 30, 2021.
“Our integrated network has a shared commitment to protecting the health and safety of our patients and the communities we serve,” said Sarah Krevans, president and CEO of Sutter Health. “I am grateful the majority of our workforce and allied physicians have already demonstrated their leadership and their confidence in the COVID-19 vaccines by getting fully vaccinated.”
Sutter joins a growing number of leading organizations across the country who are requiring employees to get vaccinated to help protect against the virus. The new policy at Sutter comes as the highly infectious delta variant is rapidly increasing the number of COVID-19 cases.
“Our rigorous COVID-19 infection prevention protocols have so far helped protect the health and safety of our patients and our workforce,” said William Isenberg, M.D., Ph.D., Sutter Health’s chief quality and safety officer. “However, these measures alone are not enough against the increasing threat of highly infectious variants like delta.”
“The only way to get ahead of this virus once and for all is for everyone who is eligible to get vaccinated as soon as possible,” Dr. Isenberg said. “The unfortunate reality is that the delta variant is driving a surge in hospitalizations throughout our network and around the country, mostly among unvaccinated people.”
According to the CDC, all COVID-19 vaccines currently authorized in the United States are effective against COVID-19, and help prevent serious outcomes including severe disease, hospitalization and death.
Sutter’s policy states all workforce members—including employees, physicians, volunteers and vendors—coming onsite to a Sutter facility or providing patient care elsewhere need to be fully vaccinated with documentation on file or have received an approved accommodation for a valid medical contraindication or religious exemption.
The announcement comes in the wake of County epidemiologist Sarah Marikos’ latest report to the Board of Supervisors Tuesday where she, along with former health officer Dr. Gary Pace, emphasized a stark difference in the infection rate of vaccinated Lake County residents versus the 40 percent of residents who remain unvaccinated.
During her presentation, Marikos said 320 new cases since the previous report to the board brought the cumulative total since the start of the pandemic to nearly 4,400. Pace said the decrease in hospital capacity during the current surge was worrisome with the number of COVID-19 patients currently hospitalized. “Hospitals are filling up,” he said, adding that there are currently 13 patients identified as positive cases and three in the ICUs locally.
Marikos noted that the majority of cases in the 18 to 49 age range in the data presented to the board this week had been unvaccinated. At press time, the County’s website had updated the recent COVID-19 death total from three to four, dating back to last month. The data shows that 37 percent of deaths, is in the 80 years and older category, with the 65-year-olds making up the bulk of the deaths at 42 percent.
