Hospitality workers want priority for shots
Having worked through a year of pandemic conditions, Amanda Schaffner thinks her industry colleagues deserve a round of shots as thanks — and not Patron or Maker’s Mark, but rather Moderna, Pfizer or Johnson & Johnson.
In fact, she said, it’s way beyond time.
“It seems really inappropriate or irresponsible and misaligned to not have hospitality employees, like baristas and bartenders, restaurant workers and all of those folks [prioritized for the vaccine]. Why aren’t
they getting a vaccine?” the president of the Pittsburgh chapter of the United States Bartenders’ Guild said in the wake of the state’s announcement Monday that many of the more onerous pandemic-related restrictions will soon be lifted or lightened.
And while an increase in hours and capacity is good for bottom lines, it creates greater potential exposure to COVID-19 for workers in an industry that perhaps has been a major part of the public face of the pandemic.
Pittsburgh Restaurant Workers Aid issued a statement in which it “implore[s] Alison Beam, Acting Secretary of the Department of Health, to give restaurant workers access to the vaccine immediately to protect workers in this industry from the risk of contracting COVID-19.”
The statement continued: “Restaurant workers cannot wait for vaccines if the indoor capacity is increased. We cannot jeopardize our health and safety for employer profit. We cannot jeopardize our unemployment benefits for refusing to come back to work due to health concerns. Forcing workers to return to work without the vaccine is forcing workers to expose themselves of the virus, and creates the potential for restaurants to become host to COVID-19 outbreaks.”
PRWA cited a University of California, San Francisco, study that found that line cooks — not nurses, not doctors, not paramedics — are at a higher risk of dying from COVID-19 than people in any other occupation. Higher mortality rates were also found among other kitchen staff and bartenders, and that number increased among Black and Latino workers.
Pennsylvania restaurant workers are slated to receive vaccines in Phase 1c of the vaccine rollout, which started at a slow pace three months ago but has picked up in recent weeks — although it remains in the 1a stage. In Philadelphia, which has its own protocol regarding vaccines,
restaurant workers have already begun to receive shots.
Ms. Schaffner concedes that it would be logistically impossible for everyone in her industry to be vaccinated before April 4. However, she said, prioritizing vaccines for this group would at least be an acknowledgment that “Hey, we’re here and we have to engage with the public in a way that is extremely risky. Can you please take that into consideration? The reality of how we’re living right now is that it’s a very high-risk way to make a living.”
A fixture behind Pittsburgh bars for more than two decades, Byron Nash was laid off at the pandemic’s outset, then returned to work in the summer at The Abbey in Lawrenceville before being laid off again in November as temperatures made outdoor dining less palatable and COVID- 19 cases began climbing exponentially.
He was also one of those COVID-19 cases.
“I was grateful that I didn’t have to go to the hospital. But it did suck. I was not a fan,” he deadpanned about the experience. He’s
pretty certain he contracted it while working, and while he holds no grudge against his employer, the nature of the job gives him pause about returning if he’s called back.
“I understand everyone’s excitement especially after being off of work, but if we’re supposed to work immediately with a higher percentage of capacity, then why aren’t we being considered the same way for the vaccine?” he asked.
“There’s going to be a slippery slope — coming out of a winter where people felt the heaviness of this more and felt depressed more, they’re ready to be out and it’s going to be really hard to manage [behavior].”
He fears that “people think they don’t have to listen to the rules because they are vaccinated, and how do you even prove that? We should be protected. We’re handling people’s food. And bartenders [are] right at speaking height, so why not make sure we’re safe before opening back up? I’m not sure why this wasn’t a priority before making that announcement.
“That’s maybe going to create another spike that none of us want, and no one
wants to get sick. People are excited about 75% capacity without thinking it through.”
It’s not just bar and restaurant employees who feel this way. Owners do, too.
At La Palapa on the South Side, Mexico City native Jesus Martinez has bobbed and weaved from every punch the pandemic has thrown to keep his American dream alive and his staff safe.
After the monthslong chore to get people to comply with mask mandates, he also fears that people will just say they are vaccinated, likening it to an 18year-old trying to pass off a fake ID — with one major difference.
“It’s not like we’ll be able to say, show me your documents. I hope that doesn’t happen. It would be nice to have the service industry moved up on the vaccination list and get it in a quicker manner. Since the pandemic started, we didn’t close completely. Of course, we need money to [survive], but we need our staff to be healthy and safe.”
Mr. Martinez related a story of third-party meal delivery drivers being indignant about having to wear masks while waiting for their orders to be packed up.
Michael Barnhouse, coowner of Lola Bistro and neighborhood pub Leo in Manchester, flat out said that until there is vaccine distribution for restaurant workers his establishments “will not be doing 75%. That’s my hill.”
Even prior to the restrictions being lifted, Anthony Falcon at Downtown’s Gaucho Parrilla Argentina said, “We’re never going back to tables that are 18 inches apart and five or six people deep at the bar” because of virus concerns.
Ms. Schaffner notes that while grocery store workers haven’t been given any vaccine preference either, they should be, and mask mandates are more easily enforced at grocery stores and customers there don’t typically engage in behaviors that need to be refereed.
“In restaurants people aren’t wearing masks when they’re eating and drinking, and after they’ve had a few, they project more and talk louder and they laugh and start to forget to put their mask on when they go to the bathroom,” she said.
“You’re already in a constant state of policing people, and the whole hospitality aspect has been stripped away. We’re trying to make people comfortable and be accommodating — the customer is always right — but somewhere in there we’ve kind of had to retrain ourselves [that], no, my safety comes first. It’s an uncomfortable way to think.”
Ultimately it’s a matter of respect, and Ms. Schaffner is tired of those who would tell her she’s lucky to be working.
“It’s like this mad dash — let’s get back to normal, and bring me a beer and french fries while you’re at it,” she said, “regardless of the vaccine status of the human being that’s providing these things to you.”
And for her, that prompts an uncomfortable question:
“Do you guys even care about us?”