While the U.S. Supreme Court’s ruling impacts businesses of one hundred or more employers, small business owners were readying themselves to follow similar protocols.
With the U.S. Supreme Court’s blockage of the Occupational Safety and Health Administration’s (OSHA’s) vaccine-or-testing rule for large employers, large and smaller businesses may want to review the COVID-19-related workplace policies to avoid OSHA fines.
Some employers may drop plans to require vaccination or administer weekly testing programs. Others may retain vaccine mandate or vaccine-or testing policies that align with OSHA’s now-halted ruling. Employers additionally will need to comply with state, local and industry level COVID-19 vaccination regulations.
Finally, and OSHA will still use the general duty clause and their Covid-19 National Emphasis Program1,2 to hold employers accountable for protecting employees.
1 https://www.osha.gov/sites/default/files/enforcement/directives/DIR_2021-03_CPL_03.pdf
2 https://www.aha.org/news/headline/2021-03-17-osha-launches-covid-19-national-emphasis-program
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Wow! These are great clarifications of the OSHA regulations, the “rule of duty to protect,” and the Supreme Court ruling. Initially, some employers at least seemed to like the OSHA rules because they wanted their employees to get vaccinated and this gave their desires a little more heft and made it possible for them to say, it isn’t just me, it’s effectively the law of the land. But as with many things these days, things unravel. Employers now in some ways have to be even more careful on vaccination policy and testing issues.