The Vaccine – Understanding What’s Next

Making Sense of Novel Healthcare and Employment Law Issues

Answering Your Vaccine Questions:

COVID-19 Vaccination: Five Key Considerations for Healthcare Employers

The question of whether or not to make vaccinations mandatory for workers is being considered by employers globally, particularly those in the healthcare sector. There are a number of key considerations that should be taken into account.

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ESTABLISHING A CPOD MODEL: 5 INITIAL STEPS FOR EMPLOYERS

A “closed point of dispensing” (CPOD) is emerging as a valuable model for employers working to make vaccines more broadly available as the US moves towards mass vaccination efforts. Establishing a CPOD requires a deliberate strategy but can be done efficiently and proactively by taking a few initial steps.

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Health Law

Questions continue to arise as to what hospitals, health systems and other healthcare providers can do to facilitate a safer and more seamless rollout. In this video, we discuss issues providers are facing now and challenges that may arise as vaccination efforts scale up, including:

Administration Considerations
Allocation Questions
Privacy and Documentation Needs

Employment Law

Employers have questions about the COVID-19 vaccine and how to update their employment policies. In this video, we answer the following questions:

Can an employer require the COVID-19 vaccine for its workforce?
What are the exceptions employers may need for a mandatory vaccine policy?
What factors should employers consider when making the vaccine mandatory or voluntary?
Are there additional considerations for employers of unionized workforces?

Are you asking the right questions as you develop your COVID-19 vaccine rollout plan?

Executives must put strategies in place now to mitigate risks and help their employees receive the vaccine in a scalable, safe and legally compliant way. We are working closely with clients across industry sectors to answer their most pressing questions on complex issues, including:

Mandating the Vaccine
Vaccine Access and Positioning Your Workforce
Administrative Issues
State-Specific Issues
Vaccine-Specific Issue

COVID-19 Vaccines: Addressing Novel Healthcare and Employment Issues | Recorded December 14, 2020

The rollout of the COVID-19 vaccine to select healthcare providers, employees and patients raises a number of unprecedented questions for hospitals and health systems as both healthcare providers and employers. While some hospitals have been selected as the first to receive and issue the vaccines, others are left wondering how they can protect their employees and high-risk patients until the vaccines are more widely available. In this discussion, healthcare, employment and health policy leaders from McDermott Will & Emery and McDermott+Consulting come together to explore the novel issues that healthcare providers should examine as we navigate the vaccination process.

topics and questions quick access

Use the handy timecodes below to quickly navigate to topics and questions you’re most interested in within the video or podcast timeline.

VACCINE ALLOCATION ISSUES 2:50: What can hospital and health systems expect in terms of vaccine distribution? How is it being distributed and how will it actually reach Americans? 3:59: How did states select providers and who has access to the first vaccine distributions? 5:30: What are some logistical challenges we are seeing that have legal or regulatory implications? 11:28: What should patients and providers know about reimbursement, coverage and other financial considerations? 13:44: What do we know now about who can get the vaccine?

EMPLOYER CONSIDERATIONS 19:03: Can hospitals, as employers, mandate the vaccine to their workforce? 20:56: What type of exceptions would an employer have to make if they decide to mandate a vaccine? 23:39: Assuming that employers can mandate the vaccine subject to those exceptions, should they? 28:15: How are hospitals thinking about prioritizing their workforce? How are they providing transparency and accountability in these decisions, as well as managing the expectations of their workforce?

PRIVACY AND DATA QUESTIONS 34:12: What does vaccine consent look like for employees who become patients, and what are concrete steps patients can take on consent-related steps? 45:47: What new or different recordkeeping and reporting obligations should hospitals keep in mind? 51:53: What additional items should hospitals be thinking about if some of this data will be used in furtherance of research, and how does that connect to the consent issues?

LOOKING AHEAD 56:29: What are the next issues that hospitals and health systems should start thinking about for the future of the vaccination rollout

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