The Ohio State community vaccination rate increased about 2 percent since Oct. 18 following the Monday second-dose deadline. Credit: Owen Milnes | Lantern File Photo
The Ohio State community vaccination rate increased about 2 percent since Oct. 18 following Monday’s second-dose deadline.
According to the Safe and Healthy Buckeyes COVID-19 dashboard, 92.2 percent of students, faculty and staff have been vaccinated, with 91.3 percent of the student population and 93.6 percent of employees having received at least the first dose of the vaccine.
The university requires COVID-19 vaccination from all students, faculty and staff, with exemptions accepted on a case-by-case basis. Students who do not receive the shot will be unable to schedule in-person classes for the spring 2022 semester.
According to the dashboard, 2 percent of 4,004 people tested positive for coronavirus in the last seven days.
University spokesperson Ben Johnson said about 6,000 people requested a vaccine exemption, with about 4,000 being students and 2,000 employees. He said around 1,000 of those individuals were asked to resubmit exemption documentation — many due to the federal employee COVID-19 vaccine mandate, which allows only religious or medical exemptions.
“Employees — including student employees — who received a personal exemption will now either need to be vaccinated or reapply for a religious or a medical exemption,” Johnson said.
Johnson said this change does not affect scheduling for student employees who received a personal exemption and now need to resubmit for another type of exemption or get vaccinated for COVID-19.
