Around one-fifth of New York City firefighters were unavailable to report for duty on Monday, most of them because they wouldn’t comply with the city’s COVID-19 vaccination requirement. The fire department (FDNY) had to suspend training and maintenance and still ended up understaffed, though maintained that operations aren’t affected. As of Nov. 1, when the vaccination mandate for city workers went into effect, about 23 percent of the city’s 10,000-11,000 firefighters remain unvaccinated. Many of them likely applied for medical or religious exemptions and would have thus not faced being put on unpaid leave while their applications are pending. Yet many of them, it appears, have chosen to go on medical leave over the past several days. The usual 7 percent medical leave rate jumped to 20 percent as of 10 a.m. Monday morning, FDNY Assistant Chief Richard Blatus testified during Nov. 1 City Council Hearing. As a result, the department …