Vaccine Mandate for Hospitals on Hold Nationally, Locally

Employees at St. Mark’s Medical Center in La Grange no longer face a vaccine mandate, at least for now.

On Nov. 4, The Centers for Medicare and Medicaid Services (CMS) issued a COVID-19 vaccine mandate for healthcare workers in the United States. Healthcare facilities that do not mandate vaccines for staff would risk losing Medicare and Medicaid payments.

St. Mark’s CEO Mark Kimball told the Record on Nov. 12 that employees at St. Mark’s would have to receive the single shot Johnson and Johnson vaccine or a first dose of either the Pfizer or Moderna vaccine by Dec. 5. Kimball said who did not get the vaccine or an exemption would be terminated.

Late last month, the United States District Court for the Eastern District of Missouri and United States District Court for the Western District of Louisiana issued preliminary injunctions against the implementation and enforcement of the vaccine mandate. The two decisions cover all healthcare workers in the U.S.

In a letter to state health agencies, CMS said it would appeal those decisions. CMS said healthcare facilities could voluntarily impose a vaccine mandate upon staff members.

In an interview this Tuesday, Dec. 7, Kimball said St. Mark’s was dropping the mandate for now.

“Since the courts have legally put the vaccine requirements on hold, the mandates are not currently being enforced against healthcare providers or staff members at this point,” Kimball said. “We’re just following the federal mandates.”

Kimball said he did not know when the court cases would be resolved, but he didn’t expect it to happen before the new year. Kimball said he is not aware of any St. Mark’s staff members who resigned due to the mandate after it was announced last month.

“Our vaccine rate continues to increase,” he said. “We still encourage staff to become vaccinated. There are a couple of accommodations for exemptions, either religious or medical exemptions. We continue to keep our employees updated. As things change we will keep them apprised. I feel there is more to come.”

Kimball said he encourages everyone to get one of the vaccines.

“The best protection for anyone is to become fully vaccinated,” he said. “That’s just following the science and understanding. I’m highly supportive of that. Where people are having problems is the mandate from the federal government – that you have to be vaccinated. That’s the rub.”

Kimball said St. Mark’s would comply with the final ruling from the courts in order to continue serving Medicare and Medicaid patients.

In other coronavirus news, Kimball said the hospital saw an “uptick” in COVID patients in recent days.

“There’s a new (Omicron) variant out there, and I don’t know if this is the new variant or not,” he said. “With the Delta variant, we saw people getting sicker and hospitalized longer, but with this new variant it’s still too early to tell. Time will tell.”