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Judge blocks Biden vaccine rule, citing “liberty interests of the unvaccinated”
A federal judge yesterday blocked a Biden administration COVID-19 vaccine mandate for health care workers, granting a request for preliminary injunction filed by Republican attorneys general from 14 states.
US District Judge Terry Doughty ruled that the government lacks authority to implement the rule that "requires the staff of twenty-one types of Medicare and Medicaid healthcare providers to receive one vaccine by December 6, 2021, and to receive the second vaccine by January 4, 2022." Providers that don't comply face penalties, including "termination of the Medicare/Medicaid Provider Agreement."
The Centers for Medicare and Medicaid Services (CMS) mandate regulates over 10.3 million health care workers in the US, of which 2.4 million are unvaccinated. The Biden vaccine rule is being challenged by the attorneys general from Louisiana, Montana, Arizona, Alabama, Georgia, Idaho, Indiana, Mississippi, Oklahoma, South Carolina, Utah, West Virginia, Kentucky, and Ohio. The Republican AGs' lawsuit was filed against CMS and the US Department of Health and Human Services.
The preliminary injunction they won applies nationwide except for 10 states that "are already under a preliminary injunction order dated November 29, 2021, issued by the Eastern District of Missouri," a court order said. Those states are Alaska, Arkansas, Iowa, Kansas, Missouri, New Hampshire, Nebraska, Wyoming, North Dakota, and South Dakota.
What states did not participate in this lawsuit and were not covered by the earlier preliminary injunction — i.e. got swept into this decision?
California, Colorado, Connecticut, Delaware, District Of Columbia, Florida, Hawaii, Illinois, Maine, Maryland, Massachusetts, Michigan, Minnesota, Nevada, New Jersey, New Mexico, New York, North Carolina, Oregon, Pennsylvania, Rhode Island, Tennessee, Texas, Vermont, Virginia, Washington, and Wisconsin.
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Thursday December 02 2021, @08:14PM
Looking at the Stooges: Larry might be in trouble. Mostly depends on whether he's a high risk candidate, for a risk which is still not very well defined. He might simply be asymptomatic or end up spending a weekend in bed. Curly may have already been infected and been asymptomatic. You can't really say unless he's been tested for previous exposure. Moe is probably going to be OK. But then again, he might have always been OK for the same reasons as Curly.
Looking at the Marx Brothers: Groucho might be fine. Unless he gets a serious case of pneumonia and puts off going to the hospital because he feels he's safe having been vaccinated. If Chico has so many antibodies, while not being infected, then there might be something seriously going wrong with his immune system. Harpo is as vulnerable as anyone else. Both Groucho and Chico can be shedding virus and not even know it. It's not simply a question of "how much" virus you're exposed to. It's where the virus enters the body, how quickly it takes hold, how quickly your body ramps up to fight it. If the vaccine "eliminated" all chance of Groucho and Chico getting infected then we've protected Harpo. But it doesn't work that way. Harpo will only ever be safe once the world has been eradicated of covid-19. If that's even possible, given that people who have had it can still get it and pass it on. Actually, I think Harpo is the most screwed of all (he should at least get vaccinated).
I like your analogy in principle, but the world is not so black and white.