The rate of hospitalizations continues to rise in Illinois because of the highly transmissible delta variant, forcing Gov. J.B. Pritzker (D-Illinois) to mandate vaccine requirements for all health care workers, college students and school teachers and staff, from prekindergarten through college.
He is also requiring indoor masking for everyone aged 2 and older.
Pritzker said that intensive care units are filling up once again.He has cited a sevenfold increase in ICU usage since July.
"Unfortunately, we are running out of time as our hospitals run out of beds,” Pritzker told the Chicago Tribune. Health experts, he said, “fear the worst is yet to come for us, to put it bluntly. Because of the delta variant, hospitals are again fighting the battle that we had hoped would be behind us by now.”
Pritzker said his No. 1 concern is keeping the state's health care system available, according to the Chicago Tribune.
Employees who are unable or unwilling to receive the vaccine will be required to be tested for COVID-19 at least once per week starting Sept. 5, Pritzker announced.
Pritzker’s vaccine mandate comes amid school openings and the rapid spread of the delta variant of the coronavirus.
