FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE
August 26, 2021
Contact: Joaquin Romero
(505) 506-5798
San Juan County Senators join letter to San Juan Regional Medical Center CEO, Sound the alarm regarding looming health care worker shortage
SANTA FE — With the deadline for Governor Michelle Lujan Grisham’s vaccine mandate for healthcare workers rapidly approaching, Republican legislators continue to raise concerns regarding the potentially catastrophic impact on rural health care facilities. One such hospital facing a health care worker shortage is San Juan Regional Medical Center (SJRMC) in Farmington, New Mexico. Today, San Juan County Senators Steven Neville and Williams Sharer joined Representatives Rod Montoya, James Strickler, and Ryan Lane in submitting a letter to the CEO of SJRMC, requesting that the hospital reject the vaccine mandate in order to avoid a rationing of care or closure of the hospital.
Senator William Sharer (District 1-San Juan) and Senator Steven Neville (District 2-San Juan) issued the following joint statement regarding their request:
“The people of northwest New Mexico must have continued access to the vital health care provided at San Juan Regional Medical Center. It is chilling to imagine the fallout if the only major hospital in our corner of the state has to close or ration care. None of us deny the dangers of COVID-19, but as the President of the New Mexico Hospital Association recently stated, the number one issue facing our hospitals right now is not COVID-19—it is staffing.”
“We hope the hospital administrators do all they can to keep their staff in place and keep their doors open. Whatever the concerns of the health care workers who are not vaccinated may be, now is not the time to turn them away. Too many lives are at stake.”
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