70 Percent Vaccinated in NJ by Memorial Day? Murphy says ‘God willing, we’ll get there’ – TAPinto.net
NEW JERSEY — Gov. Phil Murphy appeared on CNBC’s Squawk Box this morning, speaking to the hosts from Middletown about how New Jersey is tackling the pandemic and getting vaccines out to those who need it.
Murphy will be in Maplewood at 11 a.m. with Mayor Frank McGehee at the NJ Transit General Office Building on Boyden Avenue to visit NJ Transit COVID-19 Vaccination Clinic; also attending will be Department of Health Commissioner Judy Persichilli, NJ Transit President and CEO Kevin Corbett, Senator Richard Codey, Maplewood Mayor Frank, McGehee, SMART-TD Local 60 General Chairman Jerome Johnson, and ATU NJ State Joint Council Chairman Orlando Riley. Due to social distancing considerations, local press will not be allowed to attend. After that, Murphy will visit a community vaccination site in Orange.
Murphy noted that New Jersey is a nationwide leader in vaccinations. “I think we’re number four in the country in terms of administering shots. We’re up across three point three million today,” he said. “We’re trying to get to 70 percent of our adult population by Memorial Day and God willing, we’ll get there,” he said. Maplewood and South Orange have had some 2,626 residents completely vaccinated so far at Essex County vaccination sites.
“The next group up to bat is a week from Monday,” which will be March 29. Included in the cohort will be, “very happily, retail workers — who have been heroic — longshoremen — heroic — [and] others coming in. And that’s also going to be a week that the Biden administration has pointed to where supplies of vaccine doses are going to begin to go up dramatically. So that’s going to be great news. And we’ll be in a position in New Jersey — as the president has laid a marker down” that by May 1, anyone who wants to should be able to get vaccinated, “we want every everybody in our state at that point eligible. And I think…we’ll meet that with comfort.”
And when you have both doses, he added, “don’t get rid of the card” noting your vaccination. “That’s going to be something valuable… Keep the card laminated and put it in your wallet.” He also said that “what value that card will have…other than your own personal health is to be determined…. And there are lots of different potential uses for that, whether it’s go to a sporting event, getting on a plane, et cetera. So hold on to it. And again, we will first and foremost take our guidance from the CDC.”
When host Andrew Ross Sorkin asked Murphy about whether the state will require vaccines for state employees, he replied not yet but “that clearly is an option.”
Murphy also noted that President Biden’s “American Rescue Plan is an absolute game changer,” which will benefit “small businesses, child care schools, front line workers, folks who are backed up on rent, mortgage, utility payments on restaurants, on and on and on.”
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