White House announces new COVID-19 vaccine mandates

President Joe Biden has announced a series of measures to boost the number of vaccinated workers inoculated against COVID-19.

The White House announced this week that the U.S. Occupational Safety and Health Administration is crafting a rule to require that all private employers with 100 or more employees ensure their workforces are fully vaccinated or require unvaccinated workers to produce a negative COVID-19 test on at least a weekly basis. That move is expected to impact about 80 million private sector workers, according to White House estimates.

Biden also signed executive orders requiring all executive branch federal workers and employees at federal contractors be vaccinated. Those requirements, notes our colleagues at SESCO Management Consultants, are being imposed regardless of the number of employees a contractor has and with no option for workers to opt out through regular testing.

The Biden Administration also said the Centers for Medicare & Medicaid Services is taking steps to require COVID-19 vaccinations for workers in most health care settings that receive Medicare or Medicaid reimbursements, including hospitals, home health agencies, dialysis centers, and ambulatory surgical centers.