Janie Schulman spoke to Corporate Counsel about the results of a recent Gartner report, which found that a majority of organizations will not require their employees to be vaccinated for the coronavirus.
According to Janie, the Equal Employment Opportunity Commission (EEOC) has called the prescreening questions for vaccines a "medical examination" and can thus be asked only if they are job-related and "consistent with business necessity."
"The EEOC carved out an exception from this requirement: If vaccination is voluntary, and the decision to answer the pre-screening questions is voluntary," Janie explained. "This means that employers that mandate the vaccine have another avenue for being accused of an ADA [Americans with Disabilities Act] violation that non-mandating employers won't face."
She added that outside of legal risks, employers who mandate the vaccine may suffer from negative press if their employees claim that mandating the vaccine infringes their freedoms.
"The employer may also find itself losing some of its workforce due to employees who quit, or are terminated, because of their refusal to take the vaccine," she said.
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Originally published by Corporate Counsel
Because of the generality of this update, the information provided herein may not be applicable in all situations and should not be acted upon without specific legal advice based on particular situations.
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