More post-secondary institutions planning to insist on vaccinations for students and staff

More than a dozen colleges have already put measures in place, with many more expected to follow in the coming weeks.

According to NPR, vaccines have been a requirement for almost every educational institution across the country for about a century now. The issue with this particular vaccine is how new it is, among other issues.

Speaking on the legality of making vaccines mandatory, Dorit Reiss, a law professor at UC Hastings College of the Law, said:

"Most universities have the power to require vaccines. But it does depend on what the college can do generally on vaccines and what they've done in the past."

"We've never had the vaccine for the entire population authorized under EUA [Emergency Use Authorization] before. There almost certainly are going to be legal challenges because the anti-vaccine movement is already preparing for them. The main arguments will include the EUA question and the fact that these vaccines are early [in use]."

Indeed, many states are now passing measures making any kind of vaccine requirement completely illegal, which would obviously impede educational institutions as well from implementing any type of vaccine requirement.

Other states are not diametrically opposed to the idea of a vaccine passport, but do feel that such a measure would be premature at this point.

A spokesperson for Rutgers (the first university in the country to require the vaccine), commented:

"Vaccinations are an important tool for making the fall semester safe. We felt that just simply encouraging would not have the same effect as a requirement."

"This is not new. We have a whole portal for uploading your vaccine history and all those types of things. So that's already in place. And actually, this one just adds another vaccine to what's in place today."

When asked about international students, perhaps students residing in countries where the vaccine hasn't been made available yet, the Rutgers spokesperson commented:

"We can get them vaccinated. We do it ourselves. That's not a problem."