Making the rounds on local and national television Tuesday morning, Mayor Bill de Blasio sought to defend his decision, and reject criticism, over a beefed up COVID-19 vaccine mandate in New York City requiring all employers have their employees inoculated against the virus.
The mayor described the new vaccine mandates, released on Monday, as a “preemptive attack” as COVID-19 cases rise across the city during the holiday season, and as more activities move indoors. The city’s also attempting to get ahead of the Omicron variant, a new, fast-spreading version of COVID-19 whose potency continues to be the subject of much study by epidemiologists across the globe.