Termination From Employer For Refusing EUV

[RaineyRN7]

I am an Oncology nurse working for a hospital for more than 13 years. I live in California and there is now a mandate in place that is requiring me to be vaccinated before Sept. 30th or I will be terminated from my job. Not only do I not feel comfortable to receive a EUV that no long term studies have been documented because it is too new and not FDA approved but I have also witnessed friends as well as patients having severe side effects after receiving vaccination.

I am unclear how an employer has the LEGAL RIGHT to ask me personal questions about my religious beliefs or medical information (vaccination status), where are my HIPAA Rights. Employer vaccine mandates are subject to religious accommodation under the Title VII of the Civil rights act. For personal reasons I will be submitting for religious exemption to hopefully prevent me from losing my job. 

I'm not sure what the outcome will be but I am planning to seek employment elsewhere in case I do lose my job and likely it won't be in healthcare. I don't know if this will be the end of my nursing career and if it is I feel extremely sad about that. 

What happened to the phrase " my body my choice " ? 

I will not be forced to do anything to my body that I do not choose.

 Through scripture we know that God values our bodies. Our bodies are said to be a temple of the Holy Spirit, and we are called to take care of and honor God's temple. God's words lead use to use our bodies and the gifts He has given us to achieve the will of God.

[RETNAVYTHENMEDIC2RN, ADN, RN, EMT-P]

46 minutes ago, toomuchbaloney said:

I don't have intolerance for opposing viewpoints.  I have intolerance for health professionals passing off personal opinion and feelings about vaccines or employer mandates as evidence of something more important or valuable than an opinion or feeling. I have intolerance for the notion that silly or dangerous thinking shouldn't be criticized in unequivocal terms.  

Are you thinking that nosicomial covid transmission will be/could be dramatically decreased using strategies other than vaccination of hospital staff.  In the absence of vaccination transmission was as high as 15% 

This is from your reference you provided to me. Material from the report is in quotes. The information below, from YOUR source, shows HAI risks are minimal "pre-vaccine" when the appropriate mitigation steps are implemented, the transmission rates not only could, but did go down, w/o the vaccine. That being said, Once again, I am advocating for getting the vaccine. AND keeping unvaccinated RN's based on the data. Yes, the vaccine is the best way, but apparently not the only thing we can do.

"According to the meta-analysis by Zhou et al. [15], the rate of HAIs (of inpatients) is 2% but the overall proportion of Coronavirus 2 infections contracted in hospitals (all cases, including healthcare personnel) is 44%. Notwithstanding, in other studies such as the one by Rhee et al. [24], the incidence of hospital-acquired COVID-19 is low and negligible." (You must read the entirety of the report for proper context. Much of the data came from early in the pandemic in China, Hong Kong, Italy and England. One U.S. city, Boston, was used in the report. 2 cases out of 697 COVID-19 patients in Boston, for a rate of 0.002%)

"An explanation of these differences is not simple as well as a number of factors that may be associated: socio-demographic context, the lack of individual protective equipment and healthcare personnel, and the overcrowding of hospitals. The increased number of parameters to be taken into consideration and a limited understanding of the virus has proven difficult in obtaining a complete evaluation."

"The high number of HAIs refers to the first wave of the pandemic when hospitals were still unaware of how to manage the new global pandemic and individual prevention equipment was still insufficient. Compared to other reported rates of HAIs during previous global pandemics, it appears that the pandemic rates of COVID-19 are much lower [4,20]."

"The countries with the highest number of SARS-CoV-2 infections were the first to be “struck” by the pandemic (such as China, Italy, and the UK). It is possible that the hospitals in these countries found themselves “unprepared” to manage the emergency. Instead, countries that were stricken afterward had ample time and knowledge to prepare the resources needed to manage the emergency. This may have allowed for the timely diagnosis of COVID-19 cases, the proper isolation in dedicated “COVID-19” wards, and the use of efficient measures of individual protection [4].The main reasons behind the nosocomial spread were the incorrect isolation, the use of shared healthcare equipment, and the constant movements of infected personnel, (a particularly serious and widespread problem especially during the first wave of the pandemic) [16,20,44]."

"During the first phase of the pandemic, healthcare professionals unknowingly played a role in the spread of the infection. During the first months, they were confronted with the difficult situation of managing a rare and dangerous reality. The shortage of individual protective devices, the incorrect implementation of distancing measures, and work overload have favored the spread of the infection among healthcare personnel and patients. In fact, the progress that has been achieved in recent months has reduced risks. Improvements include optimized triage systems, greater knowledge of transmission and the role of asymptomatic and presymptomatic infections, better access to effective personal protective equipment, improved testing capabilities, implementation of new contagion prevention measures such as the continued use of masks in hospitals [45].

During the first stage of the pandemic, nosocomial transmission could have been considered “inevitable” due to the reality that healthcare workers were facing an emergency never experienced before and hospitals often lacked space, equipment, and supplies to handle the emergency. What could have been done to avoid hospital-acquired infections given the overcrowded hospitals (due to the quickly elevated number of patients), insufficient protective equipment and tests, and overworked healthcare personnel? Probably little or nothing. In situations of absolute emergency, even the utmost diligence and care are not sufficient due to the insurmountable difficulties of healthcare management.

With time, the scientific community began to understand how to effectively confront the pandemic. Prevention strategies were validated and forms of protection and early diagnosis (individual protective equipment, tests, tracking, and correct isolation) had become sufficient. Cases of hospital-acquired COVID-19 should be considered unexpected events that require a thorough analysis of medical records in order to determine what the miscalculations were. We must verify at what moment of the hospitalization did the infection occur, if a correct screening was performed and if there was a “failure” of the measures to prevent the risk of contagion.

Reference

https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC7827479/

Barranco R, Vallega Bernucci Du Tremoul L, Ventura F. Hospital-Acquired SARS-Cov-2 Infections in Patients: Inevitable Conditions or Medical Malpractice?. Int J Environ Res Public Health. 2021;18(2):489. Published 2021 Jan 9. doi:10.3390/ijerph18020489

[toomuchbaloney]

47 minutes ago, RJMDilts said:

That may be the case for some, but as I read through replies to my posts, unfortunately, that is not the case, although toomuchbaloney recently sent me one on HAI.  

So you made an incorrect generalization but want us to take everything you post as well sourced?

[toomuchbaloney]

2 minutes ago, RJMDilts said:

This is from your reference you provided to me. Material from the report is in quotes. The information below, from YOUR source, shows HAI risks are minimal "pre-vaccine" when the appropriate mitigation steps are implemented, the transmission rates not only could, but did go down, w/o the vaccine. That being said, Once again, I am advocating for getting the vaccine. AND keeping unvaccinated RN's based on the data. Yes, the vaccine is the best way, but apparently not the only thing we can do.

"According to the meta-analysis by Zhou et al. [15], the rate of HAIs (of inpatients) is 2% but the overall proportion of Coronavirus 2 infections contracted in hospitals (all cases, including healthcare personnel) is 44%. Notwithstanding, in other studies such as the one by Rhee et al. [24], the incidence of hospital-acquired COVID-19 is low and negligible." (You must read the entirety of the report for proper context. Much of the data came from early in the pandemic in China, Hong Kong, Italy and England. One U.S. city, Boston, was used in the report. 2 cases out of 697 COVID-19 patients in Boston, for a rate of 0.002%)

"An explanation of these differences is not simple as well as a number of factors that may be associated: socio-demographic context, the lack of individual protective equipment and healthcare personnel, and the overcrowding of hospitals. The increased number of parameters to be taken into consideration and a limited understanding of the virus has proven difficult in obtaining a complete evaluation."

"The high number of HAIs refers to the first wave of the pandemic when hospitals were still unaware of how to manage the new global pandemic and individual prevention equipment was still insufficient. Compared to other reported rates of HAIs during previous global pandemics, it appears that the pandemic rates of COVID-19 are much lower [4,20]."

"The countries with the highest number of SARS-CoV-2 infections were the first to be “struck” by the pandemic (such as China, Italy, and the UK). It is possible that the hospitals in these countries found themselves “unprepared” to manage the emergency. Instead, countries that were stricken afterward had ample time and knowledge to prepare the resources needed to manage the emergency. This may have allowed for the timely diagnosis of COVID-19 cases, the proper isolation in dedicated “COVID-19” wards, and the use of efficient measures of individual protection [4].The main reasons behind the nosocomial spread were the incorrect isolation, the use of shared healthcare equipment, and the constant movements of infected personnel, (a particularly serious and widespread problem especially during the first wave of the pandemic) [16,20,44]."

"During the first phase of the pandemic, healthcare professionals unknowingly played a role in the spread of the infection. During the first months, they were confronted with the difficult situation of managing a rare and dangerous reality. The shortage of individual protective devices, the incorrect implementation of distancing measures, and work overload have favored the spread of the infection among healthcare personnel and patients. In fact, the progress that has been achieved in recent months has reduced risks. Improvements include optimized triage systems, greater knowledge of transmission and the role of asymptomatic and presymptomatic infections, better access to effective personal protective equipment, improved testing capabilities, implementation of new contagion prevention measures such as the continued use of masks in hospitals [45].

During the first stage of the pandemic, nosocomial transmission could have been considered “inevitable” due to the reality that healthcare workers were facing an emergency never experienced before and hospitals often lacked space, equipment, and supplies to handle the emergency. What could have been done to avoid hospital-acquired infections given the overcrowded hospitals (due to the quickly elevated number of patients), insufficient protective equipment and tests, and overworked healthcare personnel? Probably little or nothing. In situations of absolute emergency, even the utmost diligence and care are not sufficient due to the insurmountable difficulties of healthcare management.

With time, the scientific community began to understand how to effectively confront the pandemic. Prevention strategies were validated and forms of protection and early diagnosis (individual protective equipment, tests, tracking, and correct isolation) had become sufficient. Cases of hospital-acquired COVID-19 should be considered unexpected events that require a thorough analysis of medical records in order to determine what the miscalculations were. We must verify at what moment of the hospitalization did the infection occur, if a correct screening was performed and if there was a “failure” of the measures to prevent the risk of contagion.

Reference

https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC7827479/

Barranco R, Vallega Bernucci Du Tremoul L, Ventura F. Hospital-Acquired SARS-Cov-2 Infections in Patients: Inevitable Conditions or Medical Malpractice?. Int J Environ Res Public Health. 2021;18(2):489. Published 2021 Jan 9. doi:10.3390/ijerph18020489

The hospitals take nosicomial infections very seriously and they have decided that the best way to protect their staff and their patients and their ability to serve the community now necessitates mandates to motivate some staff to do the correct and responsible thing and get vaccinated.  

You don't agree.  Oh well.  You got vaccinated, you should encourage others to vaccinate rather than lose their job. 

[RETNAVYTHENMEDIC2RN, ADN, RN, EMT-P]

2 minutes ago, toomuchbaloney said:

So you made an incorrect generalization but want us to take everything you post as well sourced?

IDK what you are referring too. But, facts are facts. All one needs to do is follow threads and see if I have been given any data to read or reflect on in responses to my posts. I stand by what I said. Few on here will take the time to put references to their statements or opinions.

And my generalizations about some of you are just that. It is not rocket science to see commonality in posts. It almost looks like one person with many handles at times to be honest. I suppose I should have put a disclaimer on some of them that it is my opinion not a factual statement. However, I do list references and links when I provide information that I can back up. If you don't like the source, that's really not my problem. I tend to go to NIH Library so I can find peer reviewed options. Failing that, I try to go to respected medical and nursing journals/organizations.

Heck you are giving me crap after I even said you gave me a source to check out. Go figure.

[toomuchbaloney]

19 minutes ago, RJMDilts said:

IDK what you are referring too.

I was referring to your incorrectgeneralization about older, retired or veteran nurses and citations. You generalized incorrectly. 

 

19 minutes ago, RJMDilts said:

It is not rocket science to see commonality in posts. It almost looks like one person with many handles at times to be honest.

Indeed.  The echo of voices insisting that any old excuse to remain unvaccinated is OK, coming from new members does start to look contrived. In fact some members have tried to post under a couple of different accounts names not realizing that there is no invisibility in that activity to readers.  They were embarrassed and mostly don't post anymore because they were complaining about people using multiple accounts while posting from multiple accounts.  The desire to project behavior is very strong for some passionate people.

 

19 minutes ago, RJMDilts said:

 

Heck you are giving me crap after I even said you gave me a source to check out. Go figure.

I'm sorry that you feel like interaction in these threads is tantamount to getting crap.  Did you expect that no one would engage with you unless they were in lock step agreement with your stated opinions? It's a discussion forum.  We are discussing.  

Yeah...go figure. 

[RETNAVYTHENMEDIC2RN, ADN, RN, EMT-P]

7 minutes ago, toomuchbaloney said:

The hospitals take nosicomial infections very seriously and they have decided that the best way to protect their staff and their patients and their ability to serve the community now necessitates mandates to motivate some staff to do the correct and responsible thing and get vaccinated.  

You don't agree.  Oh well.  You got vaccinated, you should encourage others to vaccinate rather than lose their job. 

Oh well? 

So, you didn't like the data so that's your response? That is where your side in the argument loses credibility. There is data, that incidentally, YOU provided, that you are unwilling to accept. Of course I have encouraged others to get the vaccine. I have advocated for others to get the vaccine ad nauseam. It had nothing to do with keeping their jobs by the way. It was because I cared about them as a person, an individual. I find it sickening that you and others in your fold find it so easy to throw the baby out with the bath water. 

You gloss over the information in the report and act like until the vaccine came along, all we did in hospitals was infect patients. When, YOUR data clearly says that is not the case. I also gave you a second reference that showed HAI is not a major source of patient infections. I am, BTW, still looking for more recent data. That said, it appears you refuse to accept the facts presented. I didn't inject any opinion in my reply, but the information from your source and my source.

Oh well, I hope patient's don't die for lack of staff who could have SAFELY, per the data, cared for them even though they were unvaxxed. I will continue to encourage everyone to get vaxxed, job status not withstanding. I will also urge management not to terminate capable, competent staff. 

[toomuchbaloney]

10 minutes ago, RJMDilts said:

Oh well? 

So, you didn't like the data so that's your response? That is where your side in the argument loses credibility. There is data, that incidentally, YOU provided, that you are unwilling to accept. Of course I have encouraged others to get the vaccine. I have advocated for others to get the vaccine ad nauseam. It had nothing to do with keeping their jobs by the way. It was because I cared about them as a person, an individual. I find it sickening that you and others in your fold find it so easy to throw the baby out with the bath water. 

You gloss over the information in the report and act like until the vaccine came along, all we did in hospitals was infect patients. When, YOUR data clearly says that is not the case. I also gave you a second reference that showed HAI is not a major source of patient infections. I am, BTW, still looking for more recent data. That said, it appears you refuse to accept the facts presented. I didn't inject any opinion in my reply, but the information from your source and my source.

Oh well, I hope patient's don't die for lack of staff who could have SAFELY, per the data, cared for them even though they were unvaxxed. I will continue to encourage everyone to get vaxxed, job status not withstanding. I will also urge management not to terminate capable, competent staff. 

LOL

Yeah.  Oh well.  You don't agree because you don't think the data supports the mandate.  Oh well. You don't have to mandate that for your staff but you don't get to decide what other health employers will decide for their staff and patients and business model. 

This isn't about me rejecting data.  I didn't dismiss anything.  I gave you proof that nosicomial covid was a concern when you expressed uncertainty that such a thing was a concern. The issue is that you don't agree with the assessment of the employers when they decided that the best way to get their remaining staff immunized against covid was a mandate. 

I hope patients aren't going to die from safety and staffing issues too, do you think the hospitals have considered the staffing issues associated with covid?

[RETNAVYTHENMEDIC2RN, ADN, RN, EMT-P]

4 minutes ago, toomuchbaloney said:

I was referring to your incorrectgeneralization about older, retired or veteran nurses and citations. You generalized incorrectly. 

 

Indeed.  The echo of voices insisting that any old excuse to remain unvaccinated is OK, coming from new members does start to look contrived. In fact some members have tried to post under a couple of different accounts names not realizing that there is no invisibility in that activity to readers.  They were embarrassed and mostly don't post anymore because they were complaining about people using multiple accounts while posting from multiple accounts.  The desire to project behavior is very strong for some passionate people.

 

I'm sorry that you feel like interaction in these threads is tantamount to getting crap.  Did you expect that no one would engage with you unless they were in lock step agreement with your stated opinions? It's a discussion forum.  We are discussing.  

Yeah...go figure. 

It appears most in here are hiding behind there screen names. I don't mind getting crap. Just an expression. Just thought it funny since I complimented you for actually giving a source. If you have not noticed, I don't mind stirring the poo up and receiving fire. As for folks not wanting to get vaxxed, I find it funny how many care whether they do or not and want to force it on them and the vitriol involved. I agree the employer has the right to mandate it. I think I even said that before a few times. My concern has always been about the ability to have staffing to actually care for the patients. Let's say I am past the point of well they should get the vax if they don't want to get fired. That's a given. The issue is what do we do when they are fired? Where are the reinforcements coming from? How many patients are the nurses expected to care for? Oh, by the way, support staff are also in short supply and are affected by this issue. We had one CNA for the first 8 hours yesterday in the ED for 40 bed unit. They normally obtain initial ECG's (w/in 10 minutes of arrival) for chest pain patients, assist in obtaining vitals in triage, moving patients, etc. As you know, they also help with a multitude of other care aspects that free us up to perform RN centric duties, which didn't happen yesterday.

Do the law suits from inadequate care become less important than the law suits from potential HAI COVID from non-vaxxed RN/CNA? Just throwing a few questions out there, aka my own rhetorical thoughts.

[toomuchbaloney]

 

15 minutes ago, RJMDilts said:

. I don't mind getting crap. Just an expression. Just thought it funny since I complimented you for actually giving a source. If you have not noticed, I don't mind stirring the poo up and receiving fire.

It's odd that you mentioned it at all if it was something that you are comfortable receiving after "stirring the poo". One might even suggest that if you seek to stir poo you might actually be looking for crap in response.

You might guess from my lack of response to your compliment that your compliment wasn't really very important to me but it does appear that it had more value for you. 

19 minutes ago, RJMDilts said:

My concern has always been about the ability to have staffing to actually care for the patients.

The unvaccinated nurses don't disappear or evaporate because they lose their position because they are unvaccinated.  The unvaccinated nurses will transition to nursing roles with employers that don't require vaccination.  Vaccinated nurses working in other areas will transition to and train to work in those positions requiring vaccination.  The potential staffing shortages could be avoided by nurses accepting the covid vaccination. 

[RETNAVYTHENMEDIC2RN, ADN, RN, EMT-P]

9 minutes ago, toomuchbaloney said:

LOL

Yeah.  Oh well.  You don't agree because you don't think the data supports the mandate.  Oh well. You don't have to mandate that for your staff but you don't get to decide what other health employers will decide for their staff and patients and business model. 

This isn't about me rejecting data.  I didn't dismiss anything.  I gave you proof that nosicomial covid was a concern when you expressed uncertainty that such a thing was a concern. The issue is that you don't agree with the assessment of the employers when they decided that the best way to get their remaining staff immunized against covid was a mandate. 

I hope patients aren't going to die from safety and staffing issues too, do you think the hospitals have considered the staffing issues associated with covid?

First, go back and read my response again. Did I say the data does not support the mandate? Resounding NO. As a matter of fact, I never said anything about the mandate. I did say twice to get the vaccine and once it was the BEST way. To refresh your memory:

       This is from your reference you provided to me. Material from the report is in quotes. The information below, from YOUR source, shows HAI risks are minimal "pre-vaccine" when the appropriate mitigation steps are implemented, the transmission rates not only could, but did go down, w/o the vaccine. That being said, Once again, I am advocating for getting the vaccine. AND keeping unvaccinated RN's based on the data. Yes, the vaccine is the best way, but apparently not the only thing we can do.

    But since you brought up the mandate, I don't think it is the ONLY thing to do, as your source showed, long before we had the vaccine.

     I truly think the administrators, as well as people like you and I, thought most would accept the vaccine without the need to mandate it and the mandate would probably motivate the remainder. Well, apparently that was not a correct assumption.

    I do think they are considering staffing issues. When they are offering Traveling RN 100+/hour that is one way they are addressing the staffing issue. The problem with that is it prompts their current RN's to leave when they see what potential money is out their. We are losing 10 in the next 30 days. They just did a temp pay raise in our enterprise for the next 30 days to try to retain RNs. And people on here wonder why I am adamant about keeping quality RN's.  I'm sure you could careless about that so I'll leave it here. 

    I'll move onto another topic or thread and leave you old timers alone on this topic. I'm 57 btw, so no Spring chicken. But, been around long enough to see the difference in younger RN's and older ones. The younger ones have different priorities and you can't expect them to see things the way you and I do, hence hesitancy, etc. Alienating them etc., does nothing to help them. Bullying, or whatever you call it (and I hate the term as it is used too frequently for too much BS and we've become a nation of whimps because of it), does nothing to move them towards the goal of getting them vaxxed and drives them out of the field. Constructive debate and willingness to look at the data and then use it does. 

[toomuchbaloney]

8 minutes ago, RJMDilts said:

First, go back and read my response again. Did I say the data does not support the mandate? Resounding NO. As a matter of fact, I never said anything about the mandate. I did say twice to get the vaccine and once it was the BEST way. To refresh your memory:

       This is from your reference you provided to me. Material from the report is in quotes. The information below, from YOUR source, shows HAI risks are minimal "pre-vaccine" when the appropriate mitigation steps are implemented, the transmission rates not only could, but did go down, w/o the vaccine. That being said, Once again, I am advocating for getting the vaccine. AND keeping unvaccinated RN's based on the data. Yes, the vaccine is the best way, but apparently not the only thing we can do.

    But since you brought up the mandate, I don't think it is the ONLY thing to do, as your source showed, long before we had the vaccine.

     I truly think the administrators, as well as people like you and I, thought most would accept the vaccine without the need to mandate it and the mandate would probably motivate the remainder. Well, apparently that was not a correct assumption.

    I do think they are considering staffing issues. When they are offering Traveling RN 100+/hour that is one way they are addressing the staffing issue. The problem with that is it prompts their current RN's to leave when they see what potential money is out their. We are losing 10 in the next 30 days. They just did a temp pay raise in our enterprise for the next 30 days to try to retain RNs. And people on here wonder why I am adamant about keeping quality RN's.  I'm sure you could careless about that so I'll leave it here. 

    I'll move onto another topic or thread and leave you old timers alone on this topic. I'm 57 btw, so no Spring chicken. But, been around long enough to see the difference in younger RN's and older ones. The younger ones have different priorities and you can't expect them to see things the way you and I do, hence hesitancy, etc. Alienating them etc., does nothing to help them. Bullying, or whatever you call it (and I hate the term as it is used too frequently for too much BS and we've become a nation of whimps because of it), does nothing to move them towards the goal of getting them vaxxed and drives them out of the field. Constructive debate and willingness to look at the data and then use it does. 

Noted.

You came here to say that everyone should vaccinate.  That HCWs should vaccinate to protect patients and that health employers are well within their rights and area of responsibility to mandate vaccination AND other pandemic mitigation as terms of employment.  

There are very few members posting in these threads who are undecided about vaccination and are genuinely looking for credible information. Most are looking for other HCWs to sympathize with their rationale for refusing vaccination or for being unhappy about the mandates. 

[toomuchbaloney]

Scientific American  published a well sourced opinion on vaccine mandates and why they can be effective.  

Quote

 

There is considerable behavioral scientific data that vaccine mandates are effective. That includes both “hard” mandates (required vaccinations for school or workplace attendance) and “soft” mandates (the choice to vaccinate or undergo regular testing and indoor masking). Hospitals that have required influenza vaccinations have achieved and maintained far higher coverage than those that make it voluntary. At the same time, K–12 school and IHE mandates have given the U.S. high vaccination rates.

When people started showing hardened reluctance to voluntarily vaccinate employers began to mandate. When people don't go along with common sense public health recommendations then we get to public health mandates at the employer level.  It would be great if people would set aside their feelings about personal freedom to participate in the larger attempt to get past this pandemic with vaccine mediated herd immunity.