SPRINGFIELD — On Wednesday, local health care workers at Baystate Medical Center became the first in the region to receive a coronavirus vaccine.
The hospital is not mandating that its employees receive the vaccine, for which the federal government only recently granted emergency approval. However, as the pandemic continues to rage across the country, a 2016 lawsuit brought against Baystate points to the ability employers have to require employees to either get vaccinated or wear a mask if they have a religious or health-related exemption for not getting vaccinated. A judge dismissed the lawsuit this summer.
In 2016, the U.S. Equal Employment Opportunity Commission brought a lawsuit against Baystate Health on behalf of an HR recruiter who Baystate suspended and then fired over her refusal to take a mandatory influenza immunization or to comply with Baystate’s alternative for those who declined immunization: wearing a mask.
The employee, who did not care for patients or work in a building where patients were seen, said she declined the vaccine because of her Christian faith. After filling out a form stating that reason for declining the influenza shot, Baystate provided her with a mask and told her to wear it at all times while in hospital buildings.
In its lawsuit, the EEOC said that Baystate disciplined the HR recruiter for pulling down her mask to speak with people over the phone and in person. Eventually, she was suspended for failing to wear her mask over her mouth and nose, the lawsuit stated.
The EEOC argued that Baystate violated the employee’s rights under Title VII of the Civil Rights Act. The federal agency said the employee’s eventual termination was based on her religious beliefs, and that the hospital’s mask requirement was not an “effective or reasonable accommodation” for her beliefs because the mask interfered with her ability to perform essential functions of her job.
However, in a two-paragraph decision handed down in June, U.S. District Judge Mark Mastroianni summarily dismissed the lawsuit against Baystate.
Mastroianni disagreed with the EEOC’s assertion that a mask requirement was not a sufficient accommodation. The judge said that a mask was a requirement of employment rather than merely an accommodation, ruling that there was no conflict between that requirement and the employee’s religion and that her religion was not the basis for Baystate terminating her.
“While Plaintiff may dispute the effectiveness of wearing a mask while performing her job (and in preventing the spread of the flu), she had no religious objection to that requirement and, as a result, the court must defer to Defendant’s business and health-policy judgment,” Mastroianni wrote in his decision. “Moreover, although Defendant had a goal of maximizing its immunization rate (thus reducing transmission), Plaintiff has not presented evidence from which a jury could find that the mask requirement was merely a pretext with the intention of forcing individuals to get vaccinated.”
Baystate spokesman Keith O’Connor declined to comment on the case, saying that the hospital system does not comment on any litigation. EEOC lawyer Sara Smolik did not respond to a request for comment.
Although the case was filed years before the COVID-19 pandemic began, employment law experts say the judge’s decision will have repercussions as coronavirus vaccines are rolled out. In a blog post in June, the employer-side law firm Ogletree Deakins noted that several courts have now approved a mandatory flu shot policy and accommodation request process.
Such a mandatory flu shot policy and accommodation request process has been approved by several courts, for example, the U.S. Court of Appeals for the Third Circuit in a 2017 case.
“Both health care providers and employers in other industries can implement and enforce mandatory flu (and COVID-19, when one is developed) vaccine policies, but detailed procedures must be put in place to provide any legally-required exceptions based on sincerely held religious beliefs or disabilities,” the firm wrote. “To defend against the potential viral increase in claims filed with the EEOC or in court, employers may want to ensure their processes and procedures — with respect to each employee and decision — are carefully documented.”
Dusty Christensen can be reached at dchristensen@gazettenet.com.