We have finally reached a critical inflection point 16 months into this pandemic. We are very fortunate in our country -- thanks to increasing vaccination rates -- to now be seeing the lowest rate of COVID-19 infections and deaths in over a year.

 

Within our Stanford Medicine health system, we are immensely grateful for our collective success in preventing our patients from contracting COVID-19 within our walls, and preventing spread among our employees. Your shared commitment to our strict protocols for testing, PPE, and physical distancing have been the keys to success.

 

We want to continue progressing toward greater degrees of normalcy without the dependence on these strict protocols. However, the emerging threat of highly infectious variants (e.g. Delta variant) is a significant risk for our unvaccinated employees, and thus for our highly vulnerable patients. Fortunately, the gift of our scientific evidence has demonstrated that vaccines are extremely safe and effective. It brings us to this next phase in our pandemic response.

 

To protect the health of our patients and our health care workers, and to preserve the safety of the Stanford Medicine health care environment, we will require all health system employees, trainees and others who regularly work within the health system to be vaccinated against COVID-19, effective Aug. 15, 2021.

 

Our commitment to this requirement comes after weeks of important discussions among many stakeholder groups. The recommendation was proposed by our Stanford Medicine Vaccine Governance Committee and approved by our COVID Clinical Oversight Resource Team (CORT). It was also endorsed by our executive leadership. We join an increasing number of health systems nationally in taking this action with urgency. We want to keep our patients, people and environment safe.

 

We are thankful that a large majority of our employees are already vaccinated, a reflection of the vaccine confidence in our community. We want to continue supporting and encouraging others who have not yet been vaccinated. Please contact Occupational Health to make a vaccination appointment -- Stanford Health Care employees can call (650) 723-5922; SHC - ValleyCare employees can send an email to [email protected]. We can also work with you to identify a more convenient location.

 

As with flu vaccinations, we will strive to accommodate those with medical contraindications or religious exemptions. Additional details about these accommodations and our overall vaccine requirement will be developed in the coming weeks by a multidisciplinary Vaccine Requirement Program Workgroup. We continue to invite input from stakeholders across the Stanford Medicine community.

 

We value your perspectives and encourage you to voice your thoughts by sending an email to [email protected]. We are also scheduling a Stanford Medicine Town Hall in the next few weeks so we can address questions you may have.

 

In the meantime, we've developed these FAQs to help answer your initial questions, and we will continue to update this resource moving forward.

 

We truly appreciate your partnership in keeping our workplace safe for our patients and each other.

Chief Medical Officer, Stanford Children's Health

Associate Dean of the Faculty for Maternal and Child Health, Stanford School of Medicine