New York State’s largest healthcare provider, Northwell Health, fired 1,400 employees on Monday who refused to get vaccinated.
The 1,400 unvaccinated employees made up less than one percent of Northwell’s workforce of more than 76,000, all of whom are vaccinated against COVID-19.
“Northwell Health is proud to announce that our workforce – the largest in New York State – is 100 percent vaccinated. This allows us to continue to provide exceptional care at all of our facilities, without interruption and remain open and fully operational,” the company said in a statement.
Former New York governor Andrew Cuomo announced in August that the state would be requiring health care workers to begin their vaccination process by Sept. 27.
However, Northwell announced its vaccine mandate in August, weeks before the state requirement, according to Reuters. The company’s mandate extended to both clinical and non-clinical workers.
“Our goal was not to terminate employees. Our goal was to get people vaccinated,” Northwell’s assistant Vice President of public relations Joe Kemp said. “Northwell regrets losing any employee under such circumstances. We owe it to our staff, our patients and the communities we serve to be 100 percent vaccinated against COVID-19.”
Kemp said the terminations will not affect patient care at Northwell’s 23 hospitals and other facilities.
