Federal agency draws a line between religious, political vaccine mandate exemptions
https://www.audacy.com/kywnewsradio...-guidance-religious-vaccine-mandate-exemption
The federal agency that enforces anti-workplace discrimination laws has new guidance about COVID-19 vaccine mandates.
The Equal Employment Opportunity Commission (EEOC) updated its guidelines to clarify to employers about vaccine mandates and religious exemptions. The new rules separate religious beliefs from political ones.
The EEOC says an employee with a sincere religious belief can be excused from a company’s mandatory COVID-19 policy, but employees do not qualify to be excused on the basis of their social, political or economic views.
“While it may be relevant to sincerity, an individual’s beliefs or degree of adherence to them can change over time,” said KYW Newsradio legal correspondent Amy E. Feldman. “So an employee’s newly adopted or inconsistently observed practices may still be considered a sincerely held belief. So it is still a bit of a minefield, to be honest.”
However, Feldman said even if an employer grants an employee a vaccine exemption based on religion, it doesn’t mean the employer is obligated to accommodate their needs further.
“Because the guidance did say that courts have found Title VII’s undue hardship on the employer would happen where religious accommodation would impair workplace safety or diminish efficiency in other jobs or cause coworkers to carry the accommodated employee’s share of burdensome work,” she explained.
“So that means even if you accept that this person has a valid religious reason not to get one, it doesn’t necessarily mean that you have to put them back where they were before.”
The EEOC says state or local laws could conflict with its guidelines, and if they do, it would need to be worked out through negotiations.
Religious and Medical Exemptions are tough to get...both require individuals to reveal very personal (private) details about their life and give the employer access to questions about issues the employee may think will be used against them if management was not aware of their personal (private) life.
Very few religions in the world have issues with vaccines and its tough to prove a medical issue unless you had a prior health problem that was caused by a medical treatment that contained an ingredient being used in the available vaccine.
For example, in my case, due to medical treatments / severe allergic reaction in the fall of 2016 when I was hospitalized for sepsis pneumonia / double pneumonia / coma...I have a well-documented allergic reaction to certain medications that caused my heart to stop twice while in a coma.
- Fast forward to 2021, my Doctor tells me I'm not suitable for J&J and Astra Zeneca. If those were the only vaccines available...
Yet, that doesn't remove me from the responsibility of having weekly Covid tests and that's problematic because many of these people seeking religious & medical exemptions are individuals that also do not want to do weekly Covid tests...
Simply, they're asswipes intentionally threatening the welfare, health, and safety of their community.
End of story - My Doctor and I did our research...Pfizer and Moderna were determine to be suitable for me. I'm fully vaccinated with Moderna but I did have complete physicals & blood chemistry work the 30 days prior to vaccination and again the 30 days after vaccination because of my medical history with a severe allergic reaction to ingredients in medical treatments and to ingredients in the FLU vaccine.
wrbtrader
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