PITTSBURGH (Newsradio KDKA) - Corrections officers in Pennsylvania state prisons want a court to stop a new mandate requiring they get coronavirus vaccines or submit to weekly testing, saying the requirement is unfair and short-sighted.
"Our issue with that is that there not applying that across the board," said John Eckenrode, President of the Pennsylvania State Corrections Officers Association. "We still have civilians coming into our institutions, whether they be visitors or contractors, and they're not being submitted to the same role that we are."
The commonwealth has around 46,000 inmates in Pennsylvania who are not being subjected to testing.
"The idea is if inadvertently they bring something back in - that could be a problem, even with the isolation of the prisoners," Pennsylvania Governor Tom Wolf said Tuesday. "It's attempt to keep them safe."
Listen to the full interview with above to learn more.