It is official, the COVID vaccine mandate has been repealed for all U.S. service members:
But the bill also ends one of Biden’s former top priorities in making the coronavirus mandatory for U.S. service members. Republican lawmakers successfully included the measure that rescinds Defense Secretary Lloyd Austin’s August 2021 order requiring troops to receive the coronavirus inoculation or face punishment, including dismissal from the military. Some 8,200 service members were discharged from the military this year for refusing the vaccine.
Republicans also tried to include a measure in the NDAA that would force the military services to reinstate those service members who were discharged because of the mandate, but that effort failed.
The Pentagon has not said what it plans to do now that the vaccine requirement has been ended. Defense Department spokespeople this week said they could not yet comment on the issue.
Stars & Stripes
You can read more at the link.
Instead of going the Chapter route to remove non-vaccinated Soldiers from the ranks, the Army has instead decided to flag them, deny them promotions, and bar reenlistments:
The Army won’t promote or reenlist troops who refuse the coronavirus vaccine and who haven’t requested an exemption, according to a memo from the service’s top civilian leader.
The new rules apply to active-duty, Reserve and National Guard troops, including those in at least one state where the governor doesn’t require the vaccine.
Army Secretary Christine Wormuth in a Nov. 16 memo lays out what will happen if soldiers refuse the vaccine and don’t have an exemption request pending. They will have their records flagged the day they make their final vaccine refusal, after a meeting with a medical professional and a second order to get vaccinated.
Stars & Stripes
You can read more at the link, but an interesting stat in the article is that about 72% of the Army is completely vaccinated. With the end of the war in Afghanistan I would not be surprised if another drawdown is coming and the non-vaccinated is turning into a way for the Army to cut its numbers.
This makes sense that there would be a rise in breakthrough infections considering how many more people in South Korea continue to get vaccinated. Plus most of the breakthroughs are from the Johnson & Johnson one shot vaccine that has a lower efficacy rate than its mRNA counterparts:
The Korea Disease Control and Prevention Agency (KDCA) said Thursday that more than 5,000 COVID-19 breakthrough infections, mostly among young men who received Johnson & Johnson’s Janssen vaccine, have been detected as of Sept. 12.
According to the KDCA, 5,880 people tested positive for COVID-19 after being fully vaccinated with the one-shot vaccine.
This means 40.2 people per 100,000 fully vaccinated patients have been subject to breakthrough infections. By age group, people in their 30s made up the largest ratio, of up to 110.1 per 100,000. (……)From Aug. 29 to Sept. 11, 10.2 percent of new cases, or 20,895, were believed to be breakthrough infections.
By vaccine type, people getting Janssen shots made up the largest portion, with 161.2 out of 100,000 testing positive, followed by 33.5 people receiving Pfizer jabs, 27.6 receiving AstraZeneca and 24.2 receiving Moderna.
Korea Times
You can read more at the link.
It is a bit surprising how slow the roll out for the vaccine has been in South Korea:
South Korea’s daily coronavirus cases dropped under 1,800 on Sunday as health authorities try to stem virus infections ahead of a major holiday amid persistent infections in the greater Seoul area.
The number of fully vaccinated people surpassed the 20 million mark, representing 39 percent of the population, with a nationwide effort to boost vaccination rates.
Yonhap
Meanwhile in Japan despite their initial slow start, they have reached a 50% vaccination rate:
Japan’s government says more than 50% of the population has been fully vaccinated.
Japan’s vaccine rollouts began in mid-February, months behind many wealthy countries due to its lengthy clinical testing requirement and approval process. Inoculations for elderly patients, which started in April, were also slowed by supply shortages of imported vaccines, but the pace picked up in late May and has since achieved 1 million doses per day.
Economy Minister Yasutoshi Nishimura, who is in charge of COVID-19 measures, told NHK public television’s weekly talk show Sunday that about 60% of the population is expected to be fully vaccinated by the end of September, on par with current levels in Europe.
Stars & Stripes
You can read more at the links.
This is kind of basic medicine to make sure doses of vaccines are not expired which these people screwed up:
Over 100 people were given Pfizer vaccines that had passed their recommended usage dates at a general hospital in Gyeonggi Province last week, health officials said Sunday.
Pyeongtaek St. Mary’s Hospital in Pyeongtaek, 70 kilometers south of Seoul, gave Pfizer vaccines to a total of 104 people on Thursday and Friday that exceeded their expiration date of Wednesday, the Korea Disease Control and Prevention Agency (KDCA) said.
The latest incident comes after one hospital in Seoul and another in the southeastern city of Ulsan gave Pfizer vaccine doses nearing their expiration dates or exceeding them to over 230 people last week.
Yonhap
You can read more at the link, but hopefully these people are not physically harmed by this.
Here is the latest on the ongoing CCPT exercise:
South Korean troops conducting a joint, computer-simulated exercise with their American counterparts were all vaccinated and tested for COVID-19 before training began, a military official said Monday.
A South Korean Ministry of National Defense official speaking on the customary condition of anonymity told Stars and Stripes that due to service members being in close proximity with each other, “it was very important for all of them to get vaccinated.”
The two countries are conducting a combined command-post training Aug. 16 to 26. Rather than a large-scale field exercise involving thousands of combat troops, this exercise will primarily focus on computer simulations.
U.S. Forces Korea spokesman Col. Lee Peters, citing the command’s policy, did not comment on whether American forces participating in the joint training were all vaccinated.
However, Peters said USFK “can reassure you that we remain aligned with [the defense ministry] on aggressive COVID mitigation measures including conducting training with minimal essential personnel and in distributed locations.”
Stars & Stripes
You can read more at the link, but the most interesting thing I read in the article was that 93% of the 550,000 ROK troops have received the vaccine though it is voluntary.
