A Louisiana federal judge has temporarily halted a vaccine mandate for healthcare workers across the nation after 13 states including Kentucky filed suit against the regulation.
Kentucky Attorney General Daniel Cameron joined the suit led by Republican Louisiana Attorney General Jeff Landry to block an emergency regulation from the Centers for Medicare and Medicaid Services that required vaccines for healthcare workers at facilities receiving Medicare and Medicaid funding.
“The court ruled [Tuesday] that the Biden Administration and CMS do not have the authority to issue a mandatory vaccination requirement for healthcare workers,” said Attorney General Cameron. “We are grateful to the court for the relief this decision brings to burdened healthcare facilities and compassionate healthcare workers, in Kentucky and across our nation, who feared losing their jobs under this mandate.”
The CMS vaccine mandate would have required over 10.3 million health care workers in the United States to be fully vaccinated by January 4, 2022, and to have received at least the first dose of a vaccine no later than Monday, December 6, 2021. Approximately 2.4 million healthcare workers are currently unvaccinated. However, that mandate is now paused pending further proceedings, according to the Kentucky Attorney General’s Office.
Other states participating in the lawsuit include Louisiana, Arizona, Alabama, Georgia, Idaho, Indiana, Mississippi, Montana, Ohio, Oklahoma, South Carolina, Utah, and West Virginia.
