During his speech at a COVID-19 vaccination site in Gwinnett County on the first day that Georgia teachers and staff could get the vaccine, Governor Brian Kemp castigated Atlanta public schools for failing to schedule their vaccination days until the end of March.
Governor Brian Kemp
Lisa Hering
“You’ll wait two or three weeks. I think they are doing their teachers a disservice, ”he said on March 8 at a vaccination site in the former Sears room on Gwinnett Place Mall in Duluth, adding that about 600 teachers in that district would be vaccinated that day.
On March 5, the Atlanta District announced that its employees and contractors would be vaccinated for three days at two events at Mercedes-Benz Stadium in downtown Atlanta, with all receiving the Pfizer vaccine, which requires two doses. The first dose is given on March 24th, 26th and 27th, the second dose on April 14th, 16th and 17th.
The district has received enough doses of the Pfizer vaccine for up to 8,000 employees and contractors, but employees can get vaccinated before these dates if they wish. The district has a total of around 10,000 employees and contractors.
Kemp also mentioned a resolution passed by the Atlanta City Council at its February 15 session to urge the state to add teachers and other key workers to the group of Georgians eligible to receive the COVID-19 vaccine .
“We didn’t have the supplies for that. That’s what I said, ”he said.
Lisa Herring, the Atlanta District Superintendent, responded to Kemp’s criticism by saying it needed time to plan vaccination days for its employees and contractors.
“Governor Kemp’s comments today are very unfortunate and do not reflect the Atlanta Public Schools’ planning, advocacy and commitment to protecting their students and staff,” she said in a statement. “(The borough) has been a leader on the COVID-19 issue in public schools from day one. Not only were we one of the first systems to go virtual to protect our staff and students, (but) we were the first to put COVID-19 surveillance tests in our system to detect COVID-19 and reduce its spread .
“We’ve been working with the Fulton County Health Department since December to vaccinate all educators and, as Governor Kemp should know, vaccines are scheduled to be delivered on the first day the Fulton County rations are available.”
Herring added that it enables us to plan the vaccination days well in advance, “through mass vaccination events for all of our employees to guarantee deadlines for the vaccine at short notice”.
“(The district) is grateful that the Atlanta Board of Education campaigned in February to accelerate the availability of the COVID-19 vaccine to our educators at a time when vaccination was expected much later.”
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