Cameron joins lawsuit against Biden’s vaccine mandate for healthcare workers
Kentucky Attorney General Daniel Cameron joined 13 other states on Tuesday in a lawsuit challenging a Centers for Medicare & Medicaid Services’ (CMS) mandatory vaccination requirement for healthcare workers.
The federal agency’s mandate would extend to staff at healthcare facilities that participate in the Medicare and Medicaid programs.
Cameron said in a release that the mandate would place an “additional strain,” on worker shortages in the healthcare sector, and would be unfair to those currently employed in those roles.
“Our healthcare workers have selflessly cared for their fellow Kentuckians during this pandemic, and now they are at risk of losing their jobs because of the Biden Administration’s vaccine mandate,” Cameron said.
The lawsuit, filed in the United States District Court for the Western District of Louisiana, calls the CMS mandate a “one-size-fits-all sledgehammer,” and claims that it violates the U.S. Constitution.
CMS Administrator Chiquita Brooks-LaSure said in a release earlier this month that the mandate is meant to mitigate risks of transmission to patients.
“Ensuring patient safety and protection from COVID-19 has been the focus of our efforts in combating the pandemic and the constantly evolving challenges we’re seeing,” Brooks-Lasure said.
The regulation requires that all eligible staff at healthcare facilities that participate in the Medicare and Medicaid programs receive the first dose of a two-dose COVID-19 vaccine or a one-dose COVID-19 vaccine prior to providing any services by Dec. 6 of this year.
The Louisiana-led lawsuit also includes the following states: Arizona, Alabama, Georgia, Idaho, Indiana, Mississippi, Montana, Ohio, Oklahoma, South Carolina, Utah, and West Virginia.
Earlier this month, Cameron joined other states in challenging the Biden Administration’s mandate that federal contractors get the COVID-19 vaccine.
