Local campus communities asking if university vaccine policy should be expanded

Should vaccines be mandatory on campus? From CTV Kitchener's Stephanie Villella: While universities in the region say vaccines will be required in residences, some say it should be mandatory on campus as well.

WATERLOO — With the recent announcement that post secondary schools in Waterloo Region and Guelph will require students staying in residences to be vaccinated, communities on the campus are starting to ask why stop there?

The University of Waterloo, Wilfrid Laurier, University of Guelph, and Conestoga College all announced on Thursday the requirement for students living on campus after it was suggested by public health.

“They asked us to look at their plans for a return to the most normal possible school year,” said Dr. Hsiu-Li Wang, the Medical Officer of Health for the Region of Waterloo. “I’ve provided some recommendations to consider and policies to increase vaccination coverage for the post secondary communities.”

Officials say living in a congregate setting like a university residence poses a greater risk of transmission for COVID-19.

“We are going to continue to work very closely with the regional officer of health to make sure we are following the appropriate guidelines,” said Nick Manning, a representative of the University of Waterloo. “We haven’t received any further guidance right now that we should be looking at a wider mandatory policy.”

Now, faculty members at UW say the university should mandate everyone on campus to get vaccinated in order to reduce the chance of spread.

Jason Thistlethwaite, a professor at the University of Waterloo, says the new residence vaccination policy is a good idea.

"An opportunity for bringing some level of normalization for students in residences," he said.

Still, he wants the university to make it mandatory for everyone on campus to be vaccinated to help reduce the spread of COVID-19.

"We're in a pandemic, so in my mind we should be throwing everything we can at this thing when we know what works, and what we know works is vaccines," Thistlethwaite said.

A campus-wide mandate would make him feel safer while teaching in lecture halls this fall, he explained.

"Public health here is locally saying, where there is one case, there's 10. And with gaps in vaccine coverage, we are likely to see that on campus," Thistlethwaite said.

But there's mixed reaction from the students and staff CTV News spoke to, with some saying mandatory vaccinations would make them feel safer, while others argue it isn’t necessary.

Thistlethwaite says he doesn't want to see the school go back into a lockdown.

"We have the tools to avoid this and there is no reason we can't be trying to adopt them," he said.