In a terse 22-page opinion, the U.S. Court of Appeals for the Fifth Circuit reaffirmed its preliminary stay that blocked the mandate-or-test Emergency Temporary Standard (ETS) late Friday, further complicating the status of...more
Note: This CMS Rule refenced in this Insight is separate and distinct from the OSHA ETS that was issued on November 4. Thus, although the CMS Rule could also be challenged in court, the November 6 court order blocking...more
11/9/2021
/ Centers for Medicare & Medicaid Services (CMS) ,
Coronavirus/COVID-19 ,
Covered Entities ,
Enforcement ,
Health and Safety ,
Health Care Providers ,
Healthcare Facilities ,
Healthcare Workers ,
Medicaid ,
Medicare ,
New Rules ,
Preemption ,
Reasonable Accommodation ,
Recordkeeping Requirements ,
Religious Accommodation ,
Vaccinations ,
Workplace Safety
Federal workplace safety officials just released the mandate-or-test workplace vaccine emergency rule, and employers are sure to have questions. The Emergency Temporary Standard (ETS) developed by the Occupational Safety and...more
11/5/2021
/ Best Practices ,
Coronavirus/COVID-19 ,
Covered Employer ,
Employer Liability Issues ,
Employer Mandates ,
Employment Policies ,
Federal Contractors ,
Healthcare Workers ,
Joint Employers ,
OSHA ,
Reasonable Accommodation ,
Recordkeeping Requirements ,
Religious Accommodation ,
Remote Working ,
Reporting Requirements ,
Unions ,
Vaccinations ,
Virus Testing ,
Workplace Illness and Injury Reporting ,
Workplace Safety
The U.S. Equal Employment Opportunity Commission (EEOC) just updated its online COVID-19 technical guidance to further explain its position regarding religious objections to employer COVID-19 vaccination requirements,...more
10/27/2021
/ Civil Rights Act ,
Coronavirus/COVID-19 ,
Corporate Counsel ,
Employment Policies ,
Equal Employment Opportunity Commission (EEOC) ,
Guidance Update ,
Religious Accommodation ,
Religious Exemption ,
Title VII ,
Undue Hardship ,
Vaccinations
As vaccine mandates increase, employers may face yet another headache in the continuing stream of pandemic-related concerns: employees presenting fake cards when asked to establish proof of vaccination. What can you do if you...more
“Are you fully vaccinated?” This seems to have become a million-dollar question that employers want to pose to their workers, but confusion abounds regarding the legal contours of this deceptively dangerous question. Many...more
Earlier this week, Texas Governor Greg Abbott issued an Executive Order immediately restricting entities in the state – including employers – from compelling any individual to receive a COVID-19 vaccination if that individual...more
10/14/2021
/ Centers for Medicare & Medicaid Services (CMS) ,
Coronavirus/COVID-19 ,
Corporate Counsel ,
Employee Benefits ,
Employee Retirement Income Security Act (ERISA) ,
Employer Mandates ,
Employment Policies ,
Executive Orders ,
Federal Contractors ,
Governor Abbott ,
Health Care Providers ,
Healthcare Workers ,
OSHA ,
Subcontractors ,
Texas ,
Vaccinations ,
Virus Testing ,
Workplace Safety
The overwhelming majority of employers cite fear of turnover and staffing shortages as a reason not to implement a vaccine mandate at their workplaces – but is this fear being overestimated? Out of the 1,578 respondents that...more
The proportion of employers mandating or considering mandating the COVID-19 vaccine increased nearly four-fold in the past three months, spurred by fears surrounding the Delta variant and the growing confidence that such...more
Although the COVID-19 vaccines are expected to receive full FDA approval – perhaps as soon as later this month – an increasing number of businesses are not waiting for full authorization and are pressing forward to require...more
The CDC’s recent recommendation that people in geographic areas with substantial or high COVID transmission rates wear masks indoors, regardless of vaccination status, has added a new wrinkle in the already challenging world...more
8/3/2021
/ Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) ,
Coronavirus/COVID-19 ,
Employee Rights ,
Employment Policies ,
Equal Employment Opportunity Commission (EEOC) ,
Health and Safety ,
Infectious Diseases ,
Masks ,
OSHA ,
Vaccinations ,
Workplace Safety
With the Delta-variant-fueled surge of COVID-19 cases leading to new CDC masking guidance, statewide mandates, and the specter of further restrictions, employers have a renewed interest in seeing the vaccination rate of their...more
The U.S. Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) announced yesterday that the agency now recommends that people in areas with “substantial” and “high” COVID-19 transmission should wear masks indoors, regardless of...more
7/28/2021
/ Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) ,
Coronavirus/COVID-19 ,
Employment Policies ,
Health and Safety ,
Infectious Diseases ,
Masks ,
New Guidance ,
OSHA ,
Personal Protective Equipment ,
Vaccinations ,
Workplace Safety
Bolstering the renewed emphasis on increasing the number of people who have been vaccinated against COVID-19, a recent memo from the U.S. Department of Justice (DOJ) that just became public confirms that the “emergency use”...more
The healthcare industry has unique data management needs as it deals with patient information that is sensitive, personal, and confidential. However, this data is often stored and spread across different facilities and...more
7/14/2021
/ Blockchain ,
Cryptocurrency ,
Data Management ,
Data Privacy ,
Data Protection ,
Data Security ,
Data Storage ,
Data-Sharing ,
Distributed Ledger Technology (DLT) ,
Electronic Medical Records ,
Electronic Protected Health Information (ePHI) ,
Health Care Providers ,
Health Information Technologies ,
Health Insurance Portability and Accountability Act (HIPAA) ,
Information Blocking Rules ,
Physicians ,
Popular
Almost six months after President Joe Biden directed the Occupational Safety and Health Administration to determine whether emergency temporary standards (ETS) concerning COVID-19 were necessary, OSHA finally issued the...more
6/14/2021
/ Anti-Retaliation Provisions ,
Assisted Living Facilities (ALFs) ,
Coronavirus/COVID-19 ,
Employee Training ,
Employer Responsibilities ,
Employment Policies ,
First Responders ,
Health and Safety ,
Health Care Providers ,
Healthcare Facilities ,
Healthcare Workers ,
Home Healthcare Workers ,
Hospitals ,
Infectious Diseases ,
New Rules ,
Nursing Homes ,
OSHA ,
Physicians ,
Recordkeeping Requirements ,
Reporting Requirements ,
Sick Employees ,
Vaccinations ,
Virus Testing ,
Workplace Safety
Concluding that a highly publicized lawsuit challenging Houston Methodist Hospital’s mandatory vaccination policy failed to state viable legal claims and misrepresented certain facts, federal Judge Lynn Hughes dismissed the...more
6/14/2021
/ Coronavirus/COVID-19 ,
Corporate Counsel ,
Dismissals ,
Employer Liability Issues ,
Employment Litigation ,
Employment Policies ,
Health and Safety ,
Health Care Providers ,
Healthcare Workers ,
Hospitals ,
Infectious Diseases ,
Physicians ,
Vaccinations ,
Workplace Safety ,
Wrongful Termination
Invoking horrific images of Nazi war crimes and employees allegedly being used as “human guinea pigs,” a new round of lawsuits are challenging employers’ rights to enforce mandatory COVID-19 vaccination requirements in Texas,...more
On the heels of Florida’s highly publicized COVID-19 vaccine passport ban, Texas Governor Greg Abbott announced on Tuesday via Twitter that he too had signed a law banning Texas businesses from requiring vaccine passports...more
Now that most states, the CDC, and OSHA have (or may soon) lift mask mandates for vaccinated workers, what is an employer to do about revealing an employee’s vaccination status? Under any relaxed masking guidance applicable...more
It appears an overwhelming number of employers are not mandating their employees receive the COVID-19 vaccine – more than four in five – but are instead encouraging their workforce to get inoculated from the virus. That’s...more
Responding to a huge looming question for employers, the Occupational Safety and Health Administration (OSHA) just issued an announcement referring businesses to the CDC’s new guidance advising that fully vaccinated people no...more
5/19/2021
/ Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) ,
Coronavirus/COVID-19 ,
Employment Policies ,
Health and Safety ,
Infectious Diseases ,
Masks ,
New Guidance ,
OSHA ,
Personal Protective Equipment ,
Vaccinations ,
Workplace Safety
The announcement yesterday from the CDC that fully vaccinated people no longer need to wear a mask or physically distance in any non-healthcare setting was a welcome relief for all Americans and a hopeful sign that we have...more
It’s been said that from crisis comes opportunity. And given that the COVID-19 pandemic has handed us the greatest collective crisis in our lifetimes, it should stand to reason that we should now be in the perfect position to...more
5/3/2021
/ Business Operations ,
Coronavirus/COVID-19 ,
Corporate Governance ,
Data Security ,
Employee Benefits ,
Employer Liability Issues ,
Foreign Workers ,
Form I-9 ,
Gig Economy ,
Healthcare Workers ,
Hiring & Firing ,
Hospitality Industry ,
Labor Relations ,
Legal Operations ,
Pay Equity Laws ,
Remote Working ,
Staffing Agencies ,
State Labor Laws ,
Wage and Hour ,
Workplace Safety
In an attempt to boost the nation’s COVID-19 vaccination rate, President Joe Biden announced yesterday that small- and medium-sized employers offering vaccine-related paid leave will be eligible for a significant tax credit....more