New York City Mayor Bill de Blasio said on December 6 he planned to issue a COVID-19 vaccine mandate for private-sector employers that will go into effect on Dec. 27, calling it a “pre-emptive strike.”

New York City will require public school teachers and staff to get vaccinated against Covid-19, Mayor Bill de Blasio said on Aug. 23, part of a push to get more residents inoculated and slow the spread of the highly contagious Delta variant.

New York City will become the first major U.S. city to require proof of Covid-19 vaccination for customers and staff at restaurants, gyms and other indoor businesses as the country enters a new phase of battling the highly contagious Delta variant.

As part of a nationwide response to the threat posed by the more contagious Delta coronavirus variant, New York City will require Covid-19 vaccinations or weekly tests for workers at city-run hospitals and clinics.

Mayor Bill de Blasio’s chief medical adviser on Feb. 25 downplayed the results of two studies suggesting that a new coronavirus variant found in New York City in November will be more resistant to vaccines now being administered.

Feb. 5 was a different sort of Opening Day at Yankee Stadium, the legendary home of baseball’s “Bronx Bombers,” as New York ramped up its drive to vaccinate the state’s most vulnerable residents, many who live in the hard-hit Bronx neighborhoods that surround the legendary sports venue.

More than 10 million Americans had received their first dose of a Covid-19 vaccine as of Jan. 13, according to the U.S. Centers for Disease Control and Prevention, as the year-old pandemic roared on unchecked.

Nearly 9 million Americans had been given their first Covid-19 vaccination dose as of Jan. 11, the U.S. Centers for Disease Control and Prevention said, as states scrambled to step up inoculations that have yet to slow the roaring pandemic.

In New York, like in much of the United States, efforts to get the two vaccines that have so far been authorized into the arms of Americans have moved slower than hoped due to a slew of issues.

New York City aims to vaccinate 1 million residents against the coronavirus by the end of January 2021, Mayor Bill de Blasio said.