Our Views: With vaccine mandate looming, LSU students shouldn’t wait to roll up their sleeves | Our Views
New LSU President William F. Tate IV bore good news last week: Among students about to start the fall semester, vaccinations against the again-surging coronavirus are surging too.
Things can only look up from last month, when just 26% of students participating in a voluntary reporting program said that they’d been vaccinated. With the delta variant spreading aggressively and severely affecting younger and healthier people, the university’s decision to hold off requiring vaccines until they’re fully approved by the Food and Drug Administration has roiled relations with faculty members who complain of being put in harm’s way.
Things are looking up even though full approval is still likely weeks off. Tate said Thursday that 5,817 of 6,203 students who’ve complied so far with new disclosure requirements report being inoculated. All students attending classes on campus must show by Aug. 22 that they’re vaccinated, have had a negative test within five days or a positive test within 90 days.
As LSU students return to campus, higher numbers than before report receiving COVID vaccine
Tate had another message to share last week, that LSU is ready to impose a vaccine mandate as soon as the FDA moves from the emergency authorization phase to full approval.
We wish the university had ended the uncertainty by seeking state authority to issue a mandate already, as a number of private colleges in Louisiana have. Full effectiveness takes as much as five to six weeks, so the longer LSU waits, the greater the risk to everyone on campus.
But we’re glad Tate’s laying down the law now, and reminding students that it will soon be a matter of when they’ll get their shots, not if.
