Illinois Healthcare Workers Fired for Refusing a Covid Vaccine Receive Settlement
Excerpted from The Defender. The wheels of justice moved quickly for Illinois Healthcare workers. Let's hope this settlement sets hospital CEOs and CFOs hair on fire the next time they consider firing healthy, "heroes" for turning down any vaccination, not just Covid. Same goes for University Presidents and any other executive who discriminates based on vaccination status. This is a silver lining from the lock down nightmare. Eyes are opening wide. Maybe wallets too.
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By Zachary Stieber
A U.S. judge approved a multimillion-dollar settlement on Dec. 19 for workers who were fired by an Illinois healthcare system for refusing to get a COVID-19 vaccine.
About 500 workers who were terminated or, after seeing their exemption requests denied, got a COVID-19 vaccine, will receive compensation as part of the $10.3 million settlement, a preliminary version of which was first announced in July.
U.S. District Judge John Kness, a Trump appointee overseeing the lawsuit brought by the workers, issued verbal approval for the settlement during a hearing, lawyers for Liberty Counsel and NorthShore University Healthsystem said. Kness plans to release a written judgment in the next week.
In a brief statement emailed to The Epoch Times after Kness’s approval, NorthShore wrote, “We are pleased with the Court’s approval of a supportive resolution to this matter and continue to prioritize the health and safety of our patients and team members.”
Harry Mihet, vice president of legal affairs for Liberty Counsel, said in a statement that the group was “pleased to finally get the court’s final approval of this classwide settlement for these health care workers who were unlawfully discriminated against and denied religious exemptions from the COVID shot mandate.”
“This case should set a precedent for other employers who have violated the law by denying religious exemptions for their employees,” he said.
Liberty Counsel, a legal group that brings cases of alleged religious discrimination, was representing the 13 named plaintiffs in the case.
The group successfully won class certification for all workers who were denied religious exemptions, a group that was initially believed to be 499 former and current workers but swelled after the preliminary settlement agreement to at least 519.
As of Dec. 12, 493 class members had submitted claims for a piece of the settlement.
Each worker who was fired stands to receive $24,225. Each worker who remained at the company stands to receive $3,725. Read more at The Defender HERE.
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Cause Unknown The Epidemic of Sudden Deaths in 2021 & 2022
By Ed Dowd, from Skyhorse Publishing. The CEO of the OneAmerica insurance company publicly disclosed that during the third and fourth quarters of 2021, death in people of working age (18–64) was 40 percent higher than it was before the pandemic.
Liberty Counsel has a great record.
Wonderful that there will be a settlement for these individuals.
Posted by: greyone | December 21, 2022 at 10:50 AM