DC officials this week unveiled a new set of vaccination protocols that expand the roster of professions deemed eligible for early vaccination. Food workers, property maintenance workers, and public transit workers are eligible this week; ride-hailing app drivers and delivery workers come online the week of March 29. Some members of one rather more prominent group also becomes eligible that week: people who work in the news media.
You won’t get to claim a shot just by virtue of spending a few minutes chatting remotely with Wolf Blitzer on Situation Room. The registration is limited to journalists or communications professionals who are required to work in-person—something that would-be vaccine recipients will likely be required to self-report when registering.
Journalists are included alongside workers at pharmacies or transportation systems because, like those jobs, reporting can require one to work in close contact with others—and some types of reporting can be hard to replicate virtually.
That means by early April, many network anchors, White House correspondents, and local reporters could be vaccinated. Those who are currently able to work from home won’t have any early eligibility and will have to wait until all residents become eligible the week of May 1.
Jane is a Chicago transplant who now calls Cleveland Park her home. Before joining Washingtonian, she wrote for Smithsonian Magazine and the Chicago Sun-Times. She is a graduate of Northwestern University, where she studied journalism and opera.
