While hypocritical Tennessee Gov. Bill Lee gives a thumb's down to incentivizing vaccines in Tennessee but is happy to reward cattle farmers for incentivizing bovine vaccines, real leaders are stepping up to help our city, state and country move past vaccine hesitancy and make us all safe again from increasingly dangerous variants of COVID-19.
Chattanooga Mayor Tim Kelly became the newest real leader with a plan: He announced late Thursday that the city will sponsor a recurring sweepstakes for Hamilton County residents - yes, everyone living in the county - who get vaccinated.
Beginning in a few weeks, residents who prove they were fully vaccinated will be able to enter a weekly drawing through the Chattanooga Area Chamber of Commerce to win $1,000. The sweepstakes vaccine incentive is expected to be funded with some of the $38.6 million Chattanooga has received in COVID relief funds.
It's a winning trend.
Ohio's Republican Gov. Mike DeWine announced his state's Vax-a-Million lottery on May 12, with prizes that included $1 million and full college scholarships. Many other states have followed suit with their own incentives - custom-outfitted trucks in West Virginia, annual passes to state parks in New Jersey, gift certificates for hunting and fishing licenses in Arkansas. Last week, President Joe Biden joined the call for incentives, encouraging state and local governments to use federal funds to pay people $100 to vaccinate.
Similarly, governments and private companies are offering perks for vaccines and proof of vaccines.
Biden has ordered federal workers and contractors to vax up or undergo frequent testing. Genesis Healthcare, the nation's biggest nursing home company, this week told workers to get a vaccine or lose their jobs. Delta Air Lines, DoorDash, Facebook and Google are just a few other private companies joining the movement.
Lee, on the other hand, has refused to follow that lead, even though Tennessee has among the lowest vaccination rates in the country and a surging number of new COVID cases, hospitalizations and deaths.
But Lee hasn't always been against incentivizing vaccinations, according to The Associated Press. In fact, under his leadership, Tennessee has spent nearly half a million dollars - yeah, our dollars - to get farmers to vaccinate their cattle against respiratory diseases and other maladies. The news made state and national headlines earlier in the week.
Tennessee's Herd Health program began in 2019 under Lee, whose family business, Triple L Ranch, breeds Polled Hereford cattle. And Tennessee now offers farmers like him up to $1,500 to vaccinate their herds.
Come on, Gov. Isn't what's good for your cattle herd good for the state's human herd? How about human "herd health" and human herd immunity?
Nah. Our governor is too "fiscally conservative" to incentivize the 61% of our unvaccinated citizens to get a vaccine, yet he's happy to pay people from other states to fly here - no vaccine passports required - for vacations if they book two nights in some of the Volunteer State's hotels and motels and "see Tennessee on Gov. Lee."
Lee, who also declined to mandate masks and vaccines, and fought counties and cities that did, epitomizes the Republican governors Joe Biden was talking about this week when he said,"I say to these governors: Please help. But if you aren't going to help, at least get out of the way. The people [businesses and smaller governments trying to incentivize masking and vaccines] are trying to do the right thing. Use your power to save lives."
Lee is the same guy who leads and defends a state health department that fired the state's vaccination chief to appease GOP legislators who were outraged over COVID-19 vaccination outreach to minors.
It is no wonder Tennessee remains below the national fully vaccinated rate of around 50% of the population, with only about 40% of residents fully vaccinated. Officials say 96% of all new cases in Tennessee and 96.9% of all COVID deaths are among unvaccinated individuals, and 96.9% of all COVID-19 deaths were unvaccinated individuals.
CBS reported Monday that Gov. Lee, speaking at the Tennessee Cattlemen's Association annual conference last Friday, said he didn't think COVID incentives were very effective.
"I don't think that's the role of government," he said. "The role of government is to make it available and then to encourage folks to get a vaccine."
Apparently that's not true if we're talking about cows.
In Hamilton County, where weekly averages for cases and hospitalizations have just risen by 1,200% and 667%, respectively, we have folks who care about our people, our children, our businesses and our lives.
Kudos, kudos, kudos to Mayor Tim Kelly and the Chamber of Commerce.