The American broadcaster CNN has fired three employees who came into work unvaccinated against Covid-19, as corporate America clamps down on vaccine-hesitant employees.
Jeff Zucker, the CNN chief, sent a memo yesterday reminding staff members that vaccines were mandatory for the office or outside where they came into contact with other employees.
“Let me be clear — we have a zero-tolerance policy on this,” Zucker, chairman of news and sports for WarnerMedia, said.
The Associated Press obtained the memo after its contents were first tweeted by the CNN media reporter Oliver Darcy. The memo did not specify the fired employees’ names, positions or office locations.
Most of CNN’s offices are already open on a voluntary basis. Zucker said more than a third of news staff members have returned. He said proof of vaccination had been taken on trust, but that might change in the coming weeks.
Advertisement
All Americans get a card with their shots, but this can be easily faked. Doctors and pharmacists record vaccine type and date. The cards offer no special marker to prove their authenticity and no scannable code to connect to a digital record.
In Britain, there has been pushback against plans to make jabs mandatory for certain activities, with Tory MPs saying it infringes civil liberties. Boris Johnson announced last month that from the end of September people would need to be fully vaccinated to enter nightclubs in England.
The CNN boss said masks would be mandatory in its Los Angeles, Atlanta and Washington offices when people were not eating, drinking or in an enclosed private space.
In offices where mask-wearing was not required, people should do what felt comfortable to them “without any fear of retaliation or judgment from co-workers”, he said.
In his note to staff, Zucker said CNN was likely to postpone its company-wide September 7 return-to-office date until some time in October. About a third of the network’s American newsroom staff are currently using the offices on a voluntary basis, he said.
Advertisement
Other American media companies have been making similar decisions because of the rise in Covid-19 cases. The AP told employees on Thursday that an expected September 13 return would also be delayed.
In May, the US federal government said it was legal for employers to require staff physically entering the workplace to be vaccinated against Covid-19.
Tech giants including Facebook, Google and Microsoft have all said they would require employees to be jabbed before returning to their US offices.
They are among several big US employers that have recently revised their virus policies, vaccine mandates or return-to-office dates as the fast-spreading Delta variant fuels another surge of Covid-19 cases.
Worries about low take-up of the jabs prompted President Biden to set out rules requiring federal staff to show they are vaccinated or else face regular Covid testing.
