The National Safety Council (NSC) is calling on all U.S. employers to mandate COVID-19 vaccinations, which the organization says are the “only recourse to combat the Delta variant and adapt to an evolving pandemic landscape.”
All employers are urged to implement COVID-19 vaccination requirements for their workers, and the NSC has introduced guidance outlining four levels of requirements for various workplace risk profiles.
Vaccines are the “clearest route to ensuring worker safety and wellbeing” in the workplace, according to an NSC news release.
When employers required vaccines, there was a 35% increase in workers who got the shot, the organization found through a recent survey.
Some guidance the NSC issued for employers who institute vaccine requirements include:
- Honor system, which requires workers to be vaccinated to return to work or to loosen mask mandates without requiring proof of vaccination status
- Partial requirement requiring workers to either show proof of vaccination status or submit to frequent COVID-19 testing
- Soft requirement which requires workers to show proof of vaccination status before returning to certain job functions or to enter a non-remote workplace, and
- Hard requirement requiring all workers to show proof of vaccination status to do their work.
The guidance follows the Food and Drug Administration’s recent formal approval of the Pfizer-BioNTech COVID-19 vaccine which replaces the emergency use authorization granted by the agency last December.
Full approval could make it easier for employers to require vaccinations and may reassure some people who are hesitant about getting the vaccine, the NSC states.
More information on encouraging vaccines, addressing vaccine hesitancy and testing in the workplace will be released in September.
