Trucking, Freight Industry Seek Faster Route to Covid-19 Vaccinations

Truck drivers like Michelle Kitchin have logged thousands of miles during the pandemic to deliver food, household goods and critical medical supplies, including the Covid-19 vaccine.

Ms. Kitchin, who hauls office furniture and produce for a midsize trucking company in Byron Center, Mich., hasn’t yet been able to get the shot herself.

“I would love to,” said Ms. Kitchin, 57, who said she hasn’t contracted Covid-19 and wants to keep it that way. She wears masks “religiously,” she said, and for much of the pandemic avoided seeing family and friends “because I just didn’t know—am I carrying it? Or if they get me sick, I don’t want to spread it across the country.”

As the U.S. vaccine rollout accelerates, freight operators and transportation groups are pushing to get their workforce better access to vaccinations, arguing their operations are crucial to keep the economy running. That is thrusting truck drivers, parcel carriers and dockworkers into a heated national debate over who should get priority for the shots, as teachers, public-transit workers and other essential workers jockey for a place in vaccination lines defined by national and regional priorities.

Transport groups say logistics workers are keeping hospitals and stores stocked with critical goods and deserve priority.

The coronavirus’s impact on the front lines of distribution has been evident at the country’s ports: a recent surge of Covid-19 cases in Southern California has thinned cargo-handling crews at the ports of Los Angeles and Long Beach, contributing to a slowdown at the gateways and congestion across U.S. supply chains.

Although transport and logistics workers are considered essential under federal recommendations for prioritizing vaccine access, many jurisdictions in setting local priorities haven’t yet made truck drivers and other logistics workers eligible. In Ms. Kitchin’s home state of Michigan, for example, freight workers can’t get the vaccine unless they are 65 and older.

Over-the-road truckers, who often spend weeks at a time hauling goods across state lines, face other hurdles as eligibility broadens. States receive doses based on their population, and some require people to live or work in a state to get vaccinated there. Shots are largely administered by local jurisdictions, but truckers don’t easily fit into operations rooted in particular places and times.

“A driver can’t just pull an 18-wheeler into a CVS parking lot, get the shot, and by the way come back three weeks later to get the second shot,” said Dan Horvath, vice president of safety policy for the American Trucking Associations. The industry group estimates there are between 500,000 and 550,000 for-hire long-haul truck drivers.

The ATA wants the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention to prioritize vaccine access for truck drivers, calling them “the linchpin of our nation’s entire frontline response” to the pandemic, in a Jan. 27 letter signed by 49 state trucking associations.

NATSO, a national trade group for the travel plaza and truck-stop industry, wants to set up vaccination centers at truck stops, where some operators already have medical clinics. The Owner-Operator Independent Drivers Association, which represents independent truckers, also recommends that step.

Truck drivers like Michelle Kitchin have logged thousands of miles during the pandemic to deliver food, household goods and critical medical supplies, including the Covid-19 vaccine.

Ms. Kitchin, who hauls office furniture and produce for a midsize trucking company in Byron Center, Mich., hasn’t yet been able to get the shot herself.

Transport groups say logistics workers are keeping hospitals and stores stocked with critical goods and deserve priority.