JABS FOR JOBS

More firms are requiring staff get vaccinated

More companies are insisting their employees get the COVID vaccine, according to a new nationwide survey.

A majority of employers — 52 percent — will require vaccinations as a condition of employment by the end of the year, up from 21 percent currently, according to the survey.

“The Delta variant has made employers take new actions to keep their workers — and workplaces — safe and healthy,” said Jeff Levin-Scherz, population health leader for Willis Towers Watson, the risk consulting firm that conducted the survey.

Even more employers are likely to institute shot mandates, he said, after the FDA’s full approval of the Pfizer vaccine last month.

Federal law generally lets employers require a vaccination, says the Equal Employment Opportunity Commission, though they must allow exceptions for religious, health or certain other reasons.

Some employers had said they would wait for the Food and Drug Administration to give its full approval to the COVID jab before making it a requirement. Before August, the Pfizer vaccine was being given under an “emergency use authorization” from the FDA as part of the effort to speed the vaccines through the normal approval process.

Now, among employers that haven’t announced a vaccine requirement, nearly a third — 29 percent — say they are planning or considering making vaccination a requirement for workplace access, and 21 percent are planning or considering vaccination as a condition of employment for all employees, said the survey of 961 companies that was conducted between Aug. 18 and 25.

Among the companies that have recently implemented vaccine requirements for some or all of their employees are Citibank, Facebook, Goldman Sachs, Google, McDonald’s, Amtrak and Cisco.

Some have even threatened to fire employees who refuse to get jabs.

Many are also requiring vaccinations for new hires.

Andrew Challenger, senior vice president of the executive-outplacement firm Challenger, Gray & Christmas, said their surveys throughout the pandemic never showed more than 3 percent of firms would mandate COVID shots.

“But then the dam broke over the last three or four weeks when we saw dozens of Fortune 500 companies saying they would require vaccinations among their employees. It gave a lot of cover for smaller companies to follow their lead,” he said.

“Companies have changed their tune very quickly,” Challenger added.

Meanwhile, in the Willis Towers survey, less than 20 percent of companies are holding out a carrot for employees, including a payout of up to $200 for workers to get vaccinated, while 2 percent are offering a discount to vaccinated employees or imposing a fee on those that have not gotten the jab, according to the survey.

Another 17 percent are considering health-premium rewards or surcharges to encourage shots.

Delta Air Lines recently announced that unvaccinated employees will need to pay an extra $200 a month for their health benefits.