Kroger will ban unvaccinated staff from getting paid sick leave if they catch COVID and will start charging non-vaxxed managers $50 monthly health insurance surcharge

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Kroger has announced it will ban unvaccinated staff from getting paid sick leave if they catch Covid and will start charging managers and workers without their jabs a $50 monthly health insurance surcharge.

According to The Wall Street Journal, the grocery store chain, which employed about 465,000 full- and part-time workers as of January 1, told employees through a company memo that Kroger will no longer hand out two weeks of paid emergency leave for unvaccinated employees who contract the virus.

The only way the Cincinnati-based chain plans to change their mandate is if local government dictates them to, the memo said, as first reported by WSJ. 

Kroger will also require unvaccinated managers and nonunion employees to pay a $50 monthly surcharge that will go towards company health insurance plans. According to the memo, both policies will be effective as of January 1, 2022. 

This comes as there's been fierce pushback on President Biden's vaccine mandate for private companies, which would require all employees to be fully vaccinated, get tested for Covid-19 weekly or face thousands of dollars in fines.

Kroger announced in a company memo that they will no longer be handing out two weeks of paid emergency leave for unvaccinated employees who come down with a case of Covid

The Cincinnati-based chain will also require unvaccinated managers and nonunion employees to pay a $50 monthly surcharge that will go towards company health insurance plans

In May, Kroger CEO Rodney McMullen penned an opinion piece for CNN and said he was implementing incentives to ensure his workers got fully vaccinated, including rewarding $100 to each associate to get their shots.

'I encourage all employers to lead by example and, where possible, to incentivize their employees,' he wrote, adding: 'More shots in arms will bring us closer to our normal lives.' 

DailyMail.com has reached out to Kroger for comment. 

Earlier this year Kroger CEO Rodney McMullen (pictured) implemented a $100 reward to incentivize his nearly half-a-million workers to get vaccinated

The mandate imposed by Kroger - one of the biggest employers in the US - comes after the Occupational Safety and Health Administration (OSHA) ordered employers with 100 or more workers back in November to either confirm that their workers are vaccinated or take weekly Covid tests by January 4, 2022.

However, OSHA's mandate has been met with a slew of lawsuits and it remains unclear if it will actually take effect. 

Just last week a US District Court judge in Savannah, Georgia, refused to mandate vaccines for federal contractors. Two days later, lawyers for the federal government filed a notice of appeal.

As a result, General Electric Co (GE) and Union Pacific Railroad retracted their vaccine requirements, according to The Journal. 

GE also paused its implementation of President Biden's executive order, which he signed in September requiring employees of government contractors to be fully vaccinated by January 18, 2022. Exemptions could only be accommodated based on religious beliefs or disabilities.

Meanwhile, New York Governor Kathy Hochul is ensuring that businesses in the Big Apple don't follow suit. 

New York Governor Kathy Hochul announced on Friday that as of Monday, masks will be mandatory in all indoor public places unless businesses or venues implement a vaccine requirement. It was met with immediate pushback from at least five of the state's 62 counties

Businesses now need to ask everyone to wear face masks, or check that every patron is vaccinated

Hochul announced her new plan on Friday and it once again mandates masks in all indoor public places unless businesses or venues implement a vaccine requirement.

It came into effect in the early hours of Monday and already, several leaders of New York's 62 counties insisted they would not enforce the new rules despite the order being scheduled to end on January 15, 2022. 

Among the counties to refuse: Livingston, south of Rochester; Madison, near Syracuse; Rensselaer in the Capital Region; and Dutchess and Rockland Counties, in the Hudson Valley.  

Each violation of the rule will carry a maximum $1,000 fine, a press release from the governors office said.  

If a business opts for the vaccine requirement, employees and patrons must be 14 days removed from the final shot of a Covid-19 vaccine sequence - either the second shot of the Pfizer or Moderna vaccines or the first shot of the Johnson & Johnson vaccine.

Mask requirements will apply to all patrons two years or older.

The mandate would apply to office workspaces as well.  

Hochul said she was not concerned by the five counties' flagrant disobeying of her rule. 

'I do have faith in New Yorkers,' Hochul said at a press conference on Monday despite claiming that the order would not be necessary had more people gotten vaccinated.

'I believe the vast majority want to do what's right, they want to put this pandemic behind us. They want to make sure we never have to go back to the days of being in lockdown.'

She also said that she was not going to be 'heavy handed' with enforcement and would instead 'monitor what's going on in the various counties'. 

'I have a close relationship with the [New York State] Association of Counties. I called them first while I was still contemplating this. I said: "I want you to know that this is something I believe in."

'They did not give me pushback. They understood,' Hochul added. 

In New York 93.4 percent of adults have at least one vaccine dose - well above the nationwide average - but cases are slowly ticking up.

'We shouldn't have reached the point where we are confronted with a winter surge, especially with the vaccine at our disposal, and I share many New Yorkers' frustration that we are not past this pandemic yet,' Hochul noted.

Also on Monday, the Supreme Court refused to halt New York's Covid vaccine requirement for healthcare workers, which does not offer a religious exemption. 

The court acted on emergency appeals filed by doctors, nurses and other medical workers who say they are being forced to choose between their jobs and religious beliefs.

As is typical in such appeals, the court did not explain its order, although it has similarly refused to get in the way of vaccine mandates elsewhere.

Justices Neil Gorsuch, Clarence Thomas and Samuel Alito dissented.

'Now, thousands of New York healthcare workers face the loss of their jobs and eligibility for unemployment benefits,' Gorsuch wrote in a 14-page opinion, which Alito joined.

'These applicants are not "anti-vaxxers" who object to all vaccines,' Gorsuch added. 'Instead, the applicants explain, they cannot receive a Covid-19 vaccine because their religion teaches them to oppose abortion in any form, and because each of the currently available vaccines has depended upon abortion-derived fetal cell lines in its production or testing.'

New York is one of just three states - along with Maine and Rhode Island - that does not accommodate health care workers who object to the vaccine on religious grounds.

The court had previously turned away health care workers in Maine, who filed a similar challenge, with the same three justices in dissent.

However, Covid cases in New York are still on the rise, just as they are across the nation.

New daily cases in the state have grown by 30 percent since Thanksgiving, from around 7,000 cases per day to nearly 10,000 - the highest daily case mark since March. 

Statewide death totals remain low, though - possibly a credit to the effectiveness of the vaccines - and have remained steady around 30 to 40 per day over the past few weeks.

The holiday season was brutal last year before the vaccines were widely available, with up to 16,000 cases popping up per day and deaths per day reaching into the 200s.

New York officials are now also having to deal with the specter of the Omicron variant. Of the 77 confirmed cases in the US caused by the variant, 21 of them have been recorded in New York. 

Another case recorded in Minnesota was in a man that had recently traveled to the state for a convention in Manhattan.

'Community spread requires a community-minded solution, as the Omicron variant emerges and the overwhelmingly dominant Delta variant continues to circulate,' Health Commissioner Dr Mary Bassett said in a statement.

'We have the tools we need to protect against the virus - and now we must ensure we use them.'

The variant was first discovered by South African health officials during the week of Thanksgiving.

The strain includes more than 50 mutations, including 30 on its spike protein, which many experts believe make it able to evade protection provided by the vaccines.

However, detected cases of the variant have been relatively minor when compared to those of the Delta variant so far - a positive sign that Omicron may not be particularly dangerous strain of the virus.

In New York City, strict vaccine requirements are set to go into effect by the end of the year.

Earlier this week, Mayor Bill de Blasio announced that private employers in his city with employees working in person would have to institute a vaccine requirement.

Children as young as five years old will also have to show proof of full vaccination before being able to enter dining, fitness or entertainment venues.

He called the controversial measure a 'pre-emptive strike' as cases began to rise once again in the city.