United Airlines is getting ready to sack several hundred employees who have refused to be vaccinated against Covid-19, as the “no jab, no job” mood spreads and companies lose patience with vaccine-hesitant workers.
United, the world’s third-largest airline when measured by fleet size and number of routes, in August became the first major US carrier to require all of its 67,000 US workers to be vaccinated against Covid-19.
United Airlines Holdings is now proceeding with plans to fire nearly 600 employees who didn’t meet its Covid-19 vaccination deadline, company officials told the Wall Street Journal.
Congratulating employees who have chosen to get vaccinated, United chief executive Scott Kirby and president Brett Hart wrote in a letter to employees: “We know for some, that decision was a reluctant one. But there’s no doubt in our minds that some of you will have avoided a future hospital stay – or even death – because you got vaccinated.”
According to US law, workers have the right to refuse vaccination – but their employers often have the right to sack them for refusing.
This also applies for Covid-19 vaccinations, according to the US Equal Employment Opportunity Commission. Unvaccinated employees are deemed to present a direct threat to others in the workplace.
Australia is going through similar pains. Vaccination against Covid is growing swiftly as more people view getting the jab as the only way out of endless lockdowns. Companies are cracking down on vaccine hesitancy and have no time for anti-vax conspiracy theories.
How Australian airlines stand on the vax issue:
- Qantas will require all frontline staff (cabin crew and pilots among them) to be vaccinated by 15 November 2021. All other Qantas employees must get the jab by the end of March 2022. Qantas has already stated that it will carry only vaccinated passengers when it resumes international services – hopefully by Christmas on some routes. No jab, no fly!
- Rex has confirmed that all frontline, customer-facing staff must be fully vaccinated against Covid-19 by 1 November 2021. It is set to be the first Australian airline to achieve that goal. The edict covers company employees working at check-in and all pilots and cabin crew across Rex regional and domestic networks.
- Virgin Australia requires all frontline and airport-based employees to be vaccinated by 15 November 2021 – “and all other office-based team members by 31 March 2022”.
United 737-900ER. Source: United Airlines
Proof of vaccination is becoming necessary to stay in hotels or to book group tours or cruises. In NSW, proof of vaccination will, within just a few weeks, be necessary to enter pubs, restaurants, cinemas, theatres and entertainment venues.
NSW Premier Gladys Berejiklian said people who choose not to be vaccinated could be denied entry to shops, restaurants and entertainment venues even when the state opens up completely from 1 December 2021.
“A lot of businesses have said they will not accept anyone who is unvaccinated,” Berejiklian told Seven News on Tuesday. “Life for the unvaccinated will be very difficult indefinitely.”
It’s not just Australia. Writing in The Conversation a few days ago, Douglas Laycock, Professor of Law at the School of Law, University of Virginia, wrote:
“The [US] government has a compelling interest in preventing significant threats to other people’s health, and especially so in a pandemic.
“The unvaccinated endanger people who are immunosuppressed or cannot be vaccinated because of their age or any other medical reason. The unvaccinated also endanger people who are vaccinated because no vaccination is 100% effective, as is evident from the number of breakthrough Covid-19 infections in the US.”
For Australian cities, vaccines are a way out of lockdown. Above: Sydney’s Central Station on a recent weekday at 6.35pm. Photo © Peter Needham
The same holds true in Australia and elsewhere. In New South Wales and Queensland, thousands of health care workers are set imminently to be taken off the job or placed on leave under vaccine mandates in both states.
“It’s pretty simple,” NSW Health Minister Brad Hazzard told reporters on Wednesday.
“If you don’t care enough to get vaccinated and look after your colleagues, if you don’t care enough about your patient, you probably shouldn’t be in the health system.”
New York City has mandated vaccination for certain public spaces – it was the first government in the US to do so. The US Supreme Court ruled in 1905 that US states could require residents to be vaccinated against smallpox or be fined. In England and Wales, mandatory vaccination was made law in 19th century, when it became compulsory for all children born after 1 August 1853 to be vaccinated against smallpox during their first 3 months of life.
Earlier this week, Australia’s Fair Work Commission backed the right of a business to fire an employee who refused to get a flu shot as required under a public health order.
The Commission’s full bench majority upheld the dismissal of a receptionist at a NSW South Coast aged care facility who refused to get a flu vaccination shot.
The Australian Industry Group welcomed the commission’s decision, saying it would influence decisions relating to mandatory Covid-19 vaccinations. Chief executive Innes Willox noted that this was the commission’s first full bench decision on the issue of vaccination mandates to be handed down during the pandemic.
“It is pleasing that the full bench has supported an employer’s right to mandate vaccinations where reasonable in the circumstances,” he told the Sydney Morning Herald.
Written by Peter Needham
Thank You Peter; very encouraging.
Vacs are like company Uniforms… you have the FREEDOM & the RIGHT to NOT wear one…just don’t come to work to excercise it.