Segregating Unvaccinated Workers? Think Twice, Attorneys Warn

Vaccinated? You’ll be on floor 1. Unvaccinated? Floor 2.

Employers can legally separate vaccinated and unvaccinated workers—by shift or floor, for example—but lawyers are cautioning against it, following recent CDC guidance that says those fully inoculated against Covid-19 can mostly shed their masks.

“It would be a stupendously bad idea to go down that road from an employee-relations perspective,” said Michael Blickman, a management attorney with Ice Miller LLP.

Most employers can generally require workers to receive a Covid-19 vaccine, but business-wide mandates have been rare, leaving workplaces mixed with vaccinated and unvaccinated employees.

As companies contemplate ...