Court Vacates Ascension Michigan’s Vaccine Exemption Settlement

A district court didn’t have jurisdiction to approve a settlement between Ascension healthcare affiliates and employees who were denied religious exemptions from the Covid-19 vaccine since Article III standing wasn’t established, a federal appeals panel said Monday.

The class action settlement was composed of 95 Ascension Michigan employees but incorrectly included 25 of the the hospital system’s out-of-state hospitals as defendants without adding any matching plaintiffs, the US Court of Appeals for the Sixth Circuit said in an unpublished opinion. A three-judge panel unanimously vacated the 2023 settlement agreement and remanded it back to the US District Court for ...