An insurance brokerage firm with offices in the Delaware Valley, but not the state of Delaware, has release information regarding newly issued vaccination mandates.
The long-expected orders have already resulted in lawsuits claiming a violation of privacy and individual rights among other things. The orders will include a large perentage of the nation’s working population.
Enforcement of the sweeping orders remain a question mark, given the sweeping nature of the orders.
Northern Delaware health care organizations including ChristianaCare, Saint Francis, and Nemours earlier ordered vaccination requirements and discharged employees who did not comply. All faced blowback but in the end only let go a small percentage of staff.
Other health care systems in areas with more vaccine skepticism in central and southern Delaware have waited for the federal mandate to be issued while assuring the public that Covid-19 testing is taking place among the unvaccinated.
Hub International issued the following
For employers with 100 or more employees. OSHA will release an Emergency Temporary Standard that will be used to enforce the mandate that is scheduled to begin after January 4, 2022 but providing paid-time for employees to get vaccinated and masking for unvaccinated workers will begin on Dec. 5, 2021.
Centers for Medicare & Medicaid Services (CMS) at the Department of Health and Human Services announced the details of its requirement that health care workers at facilities participating in Medicare and Medicaid are fully vaccinated. The rule applies to more than 17 million workers at approximately 76,000 health care facilities, including hospitals and long-term care facilities.
White House Fact Sheet, and OSHA and CMS information
New vaccination requirement for organizations with 100 or more employees
OSHA is issuing a Covid-19 Vaccination and Testing Emergency Temporary Standard (ETS) to require employers with 100 or more employees to:get their employees vaccinated by Jan. 4th and require unvaccinated employees to produce a negative test on at least a weekly basis.
All covered employers must ensure that their employees have received the necessary shots to be fully vaccinated – either two doses of Pfizer or Moderna, or one dose of Johnson & Johnson – by Jan. 4th.
After that, all covered employers must ensure that any employees who have not received the necessary shots begin producing a verified negative test to their employer on at least a weekly basis, and they must remove from the workplace any employee who receives a positive Covid-19 test or is diagnosed with COVID-19 by a licensed health care provider.
The ETS lays out a wide variety of tests that comply with the standard. The ETS does not require employers to provide or pay for tests. Employers may be required to pay for testing because of other laws or collective bargaining agreements.
All covered employers are required to provide paid time for their employees to get vaccinated and, if needed, sick leave to recover from side effects experienced that keep them from working.
All covered employers must ensure that unvaccinated employees wear a face mask while in the workplace.
Employers are subject to requirements for reporting and recordkeeping that are spelled out in the detailed OSHA materials. While the testing requirement for unvaccinated workers will begin after Jan. 4th, employers must be in compliance with all other requirements – such as providing paid time for employees to get vaccinated and masking for unvaccinated workers – on Dec. 5th.
