Minnesota Launches Vaccination Campaign Aimed at Food Service Workers

MINNEAPOLIS (AP) — Gov. Tim Walz on Tuesday launched an outreach campaign aimed at vaccinating Minnesota workers in frontline industries in the coming weeks.

The outreach effort, which is part of a broader statewide “Roll Up Your Sleeves, MN” campaign, aims to connect workers in industries like food service with opportunities to get vaccinated at state-run community vaccination sites. The campaign begins this week with workers at restaurants, bars and breweries across the state.

“Food service workers have been profoundly impacted by this pandemic,” Walz said in a release. “While we’ve expanded vaccine eligibility, we are still focused on immunizing for impact and the priority populations we identified early in this process,”

As of Sunday, more than 1.8 million Minnesotans have received at least one dose of vaccine, and nearly 1.2 million have been fully vaccinated. At least 42% of Minnesotans 16 and older have received one dose, including 83% of people 65 and older.

The Minnesota Department of Health on Tuesday reported 3,014 new cases and 4 deaths, which represent cases and deaths for both Monday and Tuesday after the state did not release an update on Sunday due to the Easter holiday.