Kaiser To Fire Vaccine-Resistant Workers In CA Early Next Year

CALIFORNIA — Over the summer, the Golden State dropped one of the toughest pandemic mandates in the nation, ordering all health care workers to become inoculated.

This month, Kaiser Permanente — which employs thousands of employees in California — announced that employees who had a vaccination exemption request denied after Nov. 7 would have until Jan. 7, 2022 to receive their first dose of vaccine.

Employees must submit proof of vaccination by that date or face termination by Jan. 10, 2022.

"We’ve decided that all employees whose exemption requests are denied will have at least 30 days after the denial to submit proof of vaccination," Kaiser Permanente officials wrote in a statement. "This covers the waiting periods between doses for the 2-dose vaccines (Pfizer and Moderna)."

To date, more than 98 percent of employees have provided proof of vaccination or requested an exemption, the company said in a statement.

California's deadline to get a first dose came down in late September, prompting health care giants such as Kaiser Permanente and Sutter Health to suspend workers.

The Golden State was the first in the U.S. to announce a vaccine mandate for health care workers. The order includes physicians, nurses, technicians, janitors and all other workers in health care facilities.

Kaiser issued a company-wide vaccination requirement three days before the state's order came down in early August.