Madison Reporter

With Americans seeking a semblance of normalcy taken for granted before the COVID-19 pandemic, one of the greatest social rifts emerging is the role of the COVID vaccine. 

Government officials across the country have made different decisions about implementing various vaccine passports or mandates. Notably, New York City was the first to require proof of vaccination status for indoor dining, entertainment shows and gyms.

"This is a miraculous place, literally filled with wonders," NYC Mayor Bill de Blasio said according to Fox News. "If you’re vaccinated, you can open the door. If you’re unvaccinated you will not be able to participate in many things. It’s time for people to see vaccination as necessary to living a good, full, and healthy life."

Other city and state officials, including Wisconsin legislators, are unimpressed with the reasoning behind vaccine passports. Boston Mayor Kim Janey strongly disagrees with de Blasio largely because non-Asian minorities and low-income populations have the lowest vaccination rates.

"We know that requiring vaccines in public venues will have a disproportionate impact on low-income families, and in communities of color, so our focus in Boston is to make sure that we are getting those vaccination numbers up across every neighborhood and in every community," Janey said in the same Fox News report. 

Vaccine passports are unwanted for many in the Badger State as well. 

The Wisconsin House passed a measure that would ban vaccine passports in the state, but Democrat Gov. Tony Evers has signaled he will veto the legislation should it reach his desk. 

House Speaker Pro Tempore Tyler August, who introduced the bill, told Madison Reporter that the vaccine should be a personal choice.

"Individuals have decided against the vaccine for a number of different reasons," August said. "Some have strong religious or medical reasons not to get vaccinated. It should not be up to one elected official or business manager to decide whether a person should get the shot."

Health-related decisions, he reasoned, are deeply personal and private, "made in conjunction with an individual’s family or health care provider, not with the clerk at the local grocery store."

According to Fox Business, Evers feels that vaccine passports are a "reasonable request" for businesses to make of patrons. 

PBS Wisconsin reported that, while new reported COVID cases have plateaued in the state, hospitalizations and deaths are increasing. Milwaukee and Madison Public Schools require staff to be vaccinated this fall, and President Joe Biden announced sweeping vaccine requirements for federal employees as well as requirements for either vaccination or regular COVID testing for private businesses with at least 100 people on the payroll. 

Nearly half of the states have banned vaccine passports by either executive order or legislation. The governors of Alaska, Arizona, Texas, Oklahoma, Idaho, Montana, Florida, Georgia, South Carolina, South Dakota, and Wyoming have banned vaccine passports by executive order. The legislatures of Utah, North Dakota, Missouri, Iowa, Indiana, Ohio, Tennessee, Alaska and Arkansas have passed measures that have been signed by their governors prohibiting vaccine passports. New York, Hawaii, California and Oregon have exempted vaccinated individuals from certain restrictions, requiring proof of vaccination.

August claims that federal HIPAA laws should protect Americans' right to private health care decisions, and that recent mandate activity is an expectation of the general public to share personal medical details with anyone who asks. 

"I felt it was my responsibility to protect an individual's health care freedoms," he said, adding that privacy has been a legislative priority of his since taking office. 

Wisconsin United for Freedom (WUFF), a health freedom advocacy group, led the charge in writing an open letter to the Biden and Evers administrations in support of vaccine choice for Wisconsinites and all Americans. WUFF was joined by 73 other groups in taking this position, all of whom signed the letter on behalf of nearly 4,000 working health care professionals. The full list of signatories can be found on the WUFF website.

The position taken in the letter is that the groups “firmly oppose vaccine mandates of any kind, vaccine passports, policies that include segregation and discrimination based on vaccine status, and private medical information, such as vaccine status, being exposed."

The letter also states that WUFF has received “alarming number of private messages, emails, and phone calls from working professionals from across the entire state, including IT Professionals, Biopharmaceutical employees, educators, private-sector employees, union members, Registered Nurses, LPNs, NPs, technicians, therapists, and a very wide range of other healthcare support workers” seeking help in the fight for freedom from vaccine mandates.

August said that Evers threatened to not sign the vaccine passport ban in an effort to scare the Senate against it. 

"I think he personally knows that vetoing this bill would be a huge mistake. Rather than standing up to his liberal handlers, he’ll talk tough in the hopes he never gets this bill on his desk," August said. "Every employee fired over their refusal to get vaccinated will only have Evers to thank if he follows through with his veto threat."