FDNY firefighters began receiving coronavirus vaccines on Tuesday – but a planned photo launch for the NYPD was canceled, with a union note citing a delay at the end of the state.
“I got it because I want to protect the people I love, the people I work with, the people I love,” said firefighter Martha Brekke, one of the first to be shot at FDNY headquarters in Downtown Brooklyn.
“I think it’s important to take care of as many people as possible.”
Between three locations – the HQ department plus the Randall Island Fire Academy and the Fort Totten EMS Academy in Queens – FDNY can now inoculate about 450 members a day.
This number includes EMS workers, who started receiving the vaccine last week.
The launch came in the face of a survey conducted earlier this month by the Uniformed Firefighters Association which indicated that more than half of smokers would refuse the vaccine.
The president of the Union, Andy Ansbro – who said that the reluctance is partly due to a “real education problem” about who needs the vaccine – was among those who received the shot on Tuesday.
“We hope this will go a long way in getting the city and the country back on track,” he said.
Ansbro praised the department’s and the union’s recent efforts to discourage firefighters’ fears through information and was cautiously optimistic that they appear to be working.
“The union had questions and answers with a virologist and we answered all the questions that our members sent us. About two dozen members contacted me saying that the work I had done had changed its mind, “he said.
“Right now it looks like a few thousand members have signed up to get this, and that’s very encouraging.”
The FDNY said on Tuesday that more than 1,000 SME workers in the city had now been vaccinated.
There are approximately 4,400 FDNY EMS workers and 11,000 firefighters.
But while the bravest lined up, the best were expected.
A note circulated Monday in the union of the Detectives’ Endowment Association, said that a planned launch for police on Tuesday was pending due to supply problems with the state.
“The state has not released the vaccine in the amount required for the NYPD,” the note reads in part.
NYPD Commissioner Dermot Shea confirmed the arrest during a large briefing on Tuesday morning, noting that the department is “looking forward” to their shots.
Union leaders dumped government bureaucracy because of the delay.
“The lives of the police and the New Yorkers we serve are seriously endangered by the delay in the COVID-19 vaccine available to the NYPD,” DEA President Paul DiGiacomo said in a statement.
“Detectives have thousands of close interactions with the public on a daily basis as we continue to keep people safe, provide nursing care and respond to calls for help,” he continued. “Following the deaths of six detectives and the current growing number of viruses, DEA members need the vaccine before another family is tragically left behind – and they need it now.”
Forty-eight NYPD members died of coronavirus, according to the department.
The head of the Benevolent Police Association, Patrick Lynch, agreed with DiGiacomo.
“Once again, politicians in Albany and City Hall are wasting time with bureaucratic gymnastics instead of looking at the reality on the field,” he said in a statement. “New York police officers are not just on the front line. We cover every part of the front line: from hospitals and housing complexes to the corner store.
“We have more daily contacts with New Yorkers than any other city agency,” Lynch continued. “We continue to push for vaccines to be made available to police as soon as possible.”
A spokesman for the State Department of Health said vaccines were about to become police officers, but that groups had given priority to them – including front-line health workers and those in nursing homes – are still inoculated.
“The NYPD, as first responders, is eligible for Phase 1b, which has not changed, and any suggestion that we stop providing vaccines is obviously false,” said Gary Holmes. “We are still in the middle of Phase 1a, which includes front-line health care workers, nursing homes and certain congregated care settings.
“The timing depends on when the vaccine supply is available and we look forward to working with the NYPD and all first responders in operationalizing the distribution of COVID-19 vaccines.”
Because they are trained and certified both for firefighting and for the administration of emergency medical services, firefighters are qualified for the first phase.
Shea said earlier this month that the vaccines would not be mandated for NYPD staff, but later opened the door for them to become potentially mandatory.