Whitley Co. Health Dept. now requiring employee COVID-19 vaccinations

Whitley County Health Department employees, staff, contractors and volunteers will now be required to be fully vaccinated against COVID-19 as part of their employment conditions.

The Whitley County Board of Health approved the vaccination requirement during its quarterly meeting Monday evening, which was held virtually. The new policy includes medical condition exemptions and exemptions for conscientiously held religious beliefs.

“I think it is really important for us to have this policy for several reasons. One is we have a role in modeling to our community the behavior we are asking others to do. As a public health entity, I think it is important for us to model our vaccination status,” Public Health Director Marcy Rein told the board.

“We provide patient care for very vulnerable patients, particularly in home health, and so we want to keep our patients safe. We want to keep the people, who come to our health department for services safe, and I have some concern for liability in that patient care or staff exposure, if we have unvaccinated staff providing care on an ongoing basis.”

She added that the Centers for Medicare and Medicaid Services are soon expected to require this for providers, such as health departments, and the rulemaking process for this is currently underway.

In other words, the health department will be required to have staff and others vaccinated in order to be reimbursed for providing Medicare and Medicaid billable services.

Rein estimated that over 88 percent of staff are already vaccinated, and said there are six employees, who haven’t been vaccinated so far.

“Overwhelmingly, staff have been on board with this and believe it is really important to do,” Rein said.

Rein anticipates that two employees will probably seek and qualify for medical exemptions, but so far the other four employees have declined to get vaccinated and she thinks they may request a reasonable accommodation exception, which might include use of additional personal protective equipment, an alternate schedule, alternate work locations, alternate duties or different patient assignments.

Rein said she doesn’t want it to get to the point where there is disciplinary process.

“I think there is room with us to work with staff to figure out where we can meet in the middle,” she added. “I want this to be a process where we can come to some agreement.”

Employees who do not meet the terms of the policy, either fully vaccinated or an approved reasonable accommodation, will face disciplinary processes up to and including termination of employment or contract.

“We definitely don’t want that to happen. We want to maintain a safe and healthy workplace and safeguard employees, families, clients, patients, and visitors,” Rein added.

In response to a board of health member question, Rein said that the four employees are in key positions, and she is not sure whether they would quit before getting vaccinated.

“There is certainly a risk that those people would decide to leave,” Rein said.

Rein would have the ultimate say on who qualifies for reasonable accommodations or what those accommodations would be, but she said she would anticipate working the employee and their supervisors to come up with those.

Under the terms of the new policy, employees can get their vaccination for free at the health department or from another provider as long as they provide proof. The employees are also free to choose any of the three vaccines that have been approved for use in the United States.

Employees will be given time off due to any side effects.

Board Chairman Dr. David Williams said that any employee with forward facing activity with patients should be vaccinated.

Rein noted that more and more health care providers are requiring COVID-19 vaccinations with the hospital’s vaccination plan expected to go into effect next month.

“I feel like we need to move forward with it. It is going to happen anyway,” said board of health member Jill West, who made a motion to approve the new policy.

Board of health member Dr. Travis Sulfridge, who is a veterinarian, was the only board member present for Monday’s meeting, who voted against the new policy.

Also, during Monday’s meeting, Rein gave an update on the COVID-19 situation in Whitley County.

As of Monday, there were 322 active COVID-19 cases with 6,561 total cases reported, and 70 deaths due to the virus.

About 25-30 percent of new cases being reported each day involve children, Rein said.

A total of 36.5 percent of Whitley County residents have been fully vaccinated. About 7.9 percent of COVID-19 hospitalizations are breakthrough cases, meaning those people were vaccinated against COVID-19.

The health department set up a vaccination clinic during Old Fashioned Trading Days and gave 35 vaccinations, in addition to 115 vaccinations during a vaccination clinic at the University of the Cumberlands.

According to the university, this included 70 students and 45 employees or their family members.

The UC clinic was managed by the health department and students from the Forcht School of Nursing assisted.

The health department is now requiring everyone inside a health department building to wear a mask.