Womble Employment Law Blog

  In the ongoing legal battle over the Occupational Safety and Health Administration’s emergency temporary standard on COVID-19 Vaccination and Testing (the “ETS”), a federal appeals court has given OSHA authority—for now—to move forward with enforcement.  The core of the ETS is the requirement that employers with more than 100 employees must implement and enforce a policy that mandates that employees be fully vaccinated against COVID-19 by January 4, 2022 or to submit to weekly COVID-19 testing and wear a mask.   However, in light of the numerous legal challenges and the uncertainties caused by the conflicting decisions in federal court, OSHA has stated that it will exercise its “enforcement discretion” to give employers some additional time to comply with deadlines published in the original ETS.  OSHA states that it will not issue any citations for non-compliance with ETS requirements before January 10, 2022, and will not issue citations before February 9, 202...

On November 5, 2021, the U.S. Occupational Safety and Health Administration published its anticipated emergency temporary standard on COVID-19 Vaccination and Testing (the “ETS”). Citing the “grave danger” posed by the virus to unvaccinated employees in the workplace, the headline-grabbing core of the ETS is the requirement that covered employers must implement and enforce a policy that mandates that employees be fully vaccinated against COVID-19 by January 4, 2022 or to submit to weekly COVID-19 testing and wear a mask.   The ETS stated that it was to take effect immediately, i.e ., when it was issued on November 5, 2021.   However, numerous legal challenges to the ETS were filed in federal courts across the country on the same day it was issued.   The challengers in the legal cases asserted, among other things, that the ETS is not valid because OSHA did not have the authority to issue the ETS and that it is unconstitutional. In one of those challenges, the ...