The madness of teachers unions opposing a vaccine mandate

The mere possibility that some schools may be forced to haggle once again with their unions to reopen school in the face of incontrovertible evidence of the need to do so is maddening enough. But the cherry on top of this sundae of public dysfunction is the fact that the national teachers unions have refused to support a vaccine mandate for teachers. “Vaccinations must be negotiated between employers and workers, not coerced,” says Weingarten. The National Education Association supports allowing an option for weekly testing for teachers instead of requiring a vaccine. New York’s state United Teachers union likewise opposes a vaccine mandate.

So the Delta variant supposedly presents a medical threat so dire that it could potentially limit schooling for the third year in a row. But it’s not serious enough to justify a vaccine requirement for teachers.

This bizarre combination of positions is the product not only of the narrow self-interest that union leaders can advocate on behalf of their members, but also an ideological hothouse they have fostered. A cadre of activists in and around the unions inhabit an alternate reality nearly as paranoid as the one constructed by the pandemic deniers on the right.