We recently learned, deep in a Rhode Island Department of Health report, that as of last month, 854 unvaccinated healthcare workers have been permitted to continue to work without medical exemption in violation of the state’s vaccine mandate.  

Major credit to Dr. Andrew Bostom for finding and publicizing this remarkable and disturbing document.

Further to this revelation, Anchor Rising contacted Governor Dan McKee’s press office with the following questions.

– Has Governor McKee’s administration taken proactive steps to block from providing health care any of the unvaccinated health care workers (HCW’s) who either do not have a medical exemption or whose exemption was declined?  If so, how many?

– Regarding the 854 HCW’s who remain unvaccinated and do not have a medical exemption, wondering why Governor McKee is permitting them to continue working despite the state’s rigid vaccine mandate?

No answers were offered by Governor McKee.  

Possibly he found these questions a tad awkward in light of the retaliatory actions taken via his authority by his former Director of Health, Dr. Nicole Alexander Scott, against one and (apparently) only one healthcare worker, Dr. Stephen Skoly, for not getting vaccinated.

Fast forward now to two days ago. Dr. Skoly’s right to practice was reinstated as a function of the state lifting the health care worker vaccine mandate that same day.  

But some major questions about Rhode Island’s handling of the COVID-19 pandemic need to be asked and answered.  The entire concept of an onerous lockdown as a response to a disease with a survival rate of 99.8% pre-vaccine.  Sending COVID-positive patients to nursing homes.  Mask mandates for those least susceptible to the disease.  More recently, the advisability of the vaccine mandate (just lifted) against healthcare workers implemented by Dr. Alexander Scott with Governor McKee’s authority and the tacit approval of the General Assembly – a mandate that has needlessly strained the state’s healthcare system by chasing away hundreds of valued workers.

Near the top of this list of questions is the state’s treatment of Dr. Stephen Skoly.  While many hundreds of healthcare workers did not comply with the state’s vaccine mandate, only one, Dr. Stephen Skoly, was singled out for punitive enforcement action by Governor McKee and Dr. Alexander Scott.  

WPRO’s Matt Allen reminded me on air Friday that Dr. Alexander Scott had stated at a press conference, in her capacity as the Director of the Rhode Island Department of Health, that vaccine mandate enforcement action would only be taken against health care workers who publicly stated they would not comply. (Science side bar:  Really??  So those who remain silent about their unvaccinated status acquire a mysterious ability to not transmit COVID-19???)  Is that the reason Dr. Skoly was singled out for enforcement action?  Because he spoke publicly about declining the vaccine for a fully valid reason?

Unequal enforcement of a law or regulation, especially when it is as glaring as it was with Dr. Skoly, is a serious abuse of power.  It must be thoroughly exposed and answered for by the officials involved.  In a setting that involves the prospect of perjury but absent a Press Secretary, however professional and pleasant, to remain silent behind.