Federal Mandate requires all SCH Employees to receive COVID Vaccine

A Federal Vaccine Mandate requiring all Stephens County Hospital employees to be vaccinated against COVID-19 or to submit religious or medical exemption is in full effect.

According to Stephens County Hospital Chief Executive Officer Van Loskoski if the hospital didn’t comply with the mandate, it could have impacted the hospital’s funding through Medicare and Medicaid.

“We’re very fortunate that we had very good compliance from our staff either with getting the vaccine or by getting a timely submission of religious exemption requests or medical exemption requests. We didn’t have any major issues with that process. I’m very thankful that our staff were compliant with that. It’s a painful process to go through because this is a heated issue, people are very strongly convicted one way or the other about whether you should receive it or shouldn’t get it,” he said.

He says the Center for Medicare and Medicaid Services is allowed to make this mandate because they decide how they spend their funds.

“This is something that was pushed down all the way up from the U.S. Supreme Court. We don’t have a choice in the matter. The U.S.S Supreme Court weighed in on it and said since what is at stake here is Medicare and Medicaid funding, and Medicare and Medicaid Program can decide how they want to spend it, so they have the authority to issue that kind of legislation. It says if you want to receive Medicare and Medicaid funding then you have to comply with this, and for us that accounts for about 45 percent of our total revenue,” he said.

He says no hospital can survive without funding through the Center for Medicare and Medicaid Services.

Stephens County Hospital will continue to have its employees vaccinated against COVID-19 or have them submit religious or medical exemptions.

WNEG News will continue to follow this story and bring you updates as they become available.