Anti-vax emailer at NYCHA is suspended
A New York City Housing Authority staffer has been indefinitely suspended for using her work email to disseminate offensive messages comparing Mayor de Blasio’s COVID-19 vaccine policies to “locking the door on the Twin Towers on 9/11,” the Daily News has learned.
Andrea Psoras, who works in financial reporting for NYCHA and sent the wild email messages to dozens of journalists and agency chairman Greg Russ earlier this week, said on Friday that she had received a call from a supervisor informing her of the unpaid suspension.
A letter sent from NYCHA management that Psoras shared with The News states that she’s being placed on leave under Section 72 of the city’s civil service law, which allows municipal agencies to suspend employees “with a physical or mental disability.”
The letter says Psoras can request an administrative hearing to challenge her suspension — which she affirmed she intends to do.
“I’m not wrong in what I have done,” said Psoras, 63. “I wanted as many people as possible to know about this.”
A NYCHA spokeswoman declined to comment.
The unsettling message blasted out by Psoras on Wednesday to reporters from The News and other outlets lamented de Blasio’s requirement for all municipal workers, including NYCHA employees, to either get vaccinated against COVID-19 or submit to weekly tests.
“Any mandate of these pharmas is the same as locking the door on the Twin Towers on 9/11 and keeping the people inside to die in 9/11,” part of Psoras’ email read. “Any mandate of these toxic pharma treatments is putting people in the cattle cars to the concentration camps and upping the count of the Holocaust.”
Psoras’ message also linked to a string of debunked conspiracy theories claiming that coronavirus vaccines are dangerous.
Despite Psoras’ claims, COVID-19 vaccines have proven to be safe and effective in protecting people against the deadly virus.
More than 20% of the city’s adult population still hasn’t gotten vaccinated, even though COVID-19 has killed more than 50,000 New Yorkers.
Vaccination rates are especially low among municipal workers.
NYCHA has one of the lowest rates out of all city agencies, with just 46% of its workforce vaccinated as of Sept. 7, according to data released by the de Blasio administration.
Public health experts say the battle against the virus in the U.S. likely can’t be won unless at least 90% of the population gets vaccinated. According to data from the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention, about 76% of adult Americans had gotten at least one dose of COVID-19 vaccine as of late Friday.