Employees must be vaccinated against Covid

Southwest Airlines said Monday its 56,000 employees needed to be vaccinated against Covid-19 by December 8 to continue working at the airline due to the new federal rules, joining other carriers who made similar announcements the last week.

The Biden administration said last month that federal contract staff must be vaccinated, unless they have a religious or medical exemption.

Southwest and other major airlines are federal contractors as they transport government workers, freight and provide other services, such as flights for evacuees from Afghanistan in August. The new federal guidelines for government contractors are stricter than those in President Joe Biden’s plan to increase vaccinations in companies with more than 100 employees by requiring regular inoculations or Covid testing.

“Southwest Airlines is a federal contractor and we have no viable choice but to comply with the US government’s mandate for employees to be vaccinated, and – like other airlines – we are taking action to get us there. comply, ”Gary Kelly, CEO of Dallas- based airline, said to staff Monday.

American and Southwest pilot unions have strongly opposed vaccination mandates, saying airmen are concerned about side effects of vaccines

Kelly said the ruling that the provisions for medical and religious exemptions are “very limited.”

Alaska Airlines, JetBlue Airways and American Airlines told their employees last week that they needed to be vaccinated because those airlines are also government contractors.

United Airlines mandated vaccines for its US workforce of 67,000 in August and more than 96% had uploaded proof of vaccination after the deadline a week ago.

Delta Air Lines, also a federal contractor, said it was reviewing federal rules and had not mandated vaccines for its staff of around 80,000 people.

The Atlanta-based airline plans to impose a monthly surcharge of $ 200 on employee health care premiums for unvaccinated workers next month.

“Delta’s own approach to encouraging a high employee vaccination rate continues to work, with the vaccination rate 84% of the workforce increasing daily,” the airline said in a statement.