President Joe Biden once promised that COVID-19 vaccines would never become mandatory. Though Biden later broke that vow and issued a federal vaccine mandate for private employers through the Occupational Safety and Health Administration (OSHA), the statute was blocked at the Supreme Court.
In the aftermath of the ruling, many large corporations — such as Starbucks — have rescinded their vaccine requirements. However, the ruling made no impact on the vaccination policies of other businesses, such as apparel manufacturer Carhartt. The Supreme Court’s decision also has no direct effect on President Biden’s vaccine mandate for federal employees and contractors — or the mandates implemented by local leaders in New York City and other metropolitan areas.
In other words: the war still rages against vicious biomedical tyranny — a phenomenon that has lost countless Americans their livelihoods.
The Daily Wire spoke to three such individuals.
‘Thrown Out Into The Proverbial Cold’
Lacey Scalf of Tulsa, Oklahoma, worked as a nurse for the health department of a major Native tribe. In July of last year, the nation sent a memorandum announcing that COVID-19 variants present “a potentially severe threat,” announcing that noncompliant employees would be subject to “voluntary resignation” if they remained unvaccinated as of September 10, 2021.
Why did Scalf decide against COVID-19 vaccination? “I was not, nor will I ever be, vaccinated for a multitude of reasons, including fearmongering, low potential of mortality due to my healthy lifestyle, and years of exposure to germs and viruses at the hospital that have provided me with a strong immune system.” In addition to vaccine side effects and a desire to avoid consenting to government overreach, Scarf cited her Christian convictions with respect to the infinite value of preborn babies as image-bearers of God.
Scarf is troubled by the role that abortion-derived fetal cells played in the development of the COVID-19 vaccines. “The shedding of innocent blood is an abomination in the Lord’s eyes, and our profit from it, no matter how small, is viewed in kind.”
She cited Proverbs 24:11-12 — “Rescue those who are being taken away to death; hold back those who are stumbling to the slaughter. If you say, ‘Behold, we did not know this,’ does not He who weighs the heart perceive it? Does not he who keeps watch over your soul know it, and will He not repay man according to His work?”
“Therefore, I will not participate in this vaccine, because I serve a righteous and holy God, who in His omniscience weighs my every word, thought, and deed and will repay me accordingly.”
Scalf’s employer nevertheless ignored her convictions. Though she submitted both religious and medical exemptions, she said she received no answer until September 8 — two days before the vaccination deadline. She also “never received an explanation, even after requesting it.”
Scalf added that the loss of her job affected her deeply, since at the time she was a single woman recovering from a recent knee surgery. “So, I went months without an income. Luckily, I had family that stepped in the gap for provision and help.”
Though losing her job affected her career trajectory in the healthcare system, Scalf’s primary concern remains with “my patients and the patients of other healthcare professionals, who like me, refuse to have their freedoms removed, that suffer.”
“The grant I worked on was manned by myself alone for over one year and focused on those individuals within our healthcare system that suffered with extreme hypertension and stroke risk, or had a history of stroke,” she added. “Because of the short timing in knowing if my exemptions would be approved or denied, my patients had no warning that come Monday morning, I would no longer be working with them to help case-manage their health concerns.”
“Because I am young, I can recover, but it is a reality that I know has already come to pass, that nurses who have given decades of outstanding, upstanding, and diligent care to patients will be let go from their positions, and thrown out into the proverbial cold, based on potential harm to those same people we long to protect and prolong life for daily,” Scalf continued.
“It always seemed odd to me that it was perfectly fine for us to work overtime covering the COVID crisis areas when the pandemic first started without any vaccine or protection, but now when there is an incentive given to the company or entity that vaccinates employees, we see a fear introduced that we have become a risk for all peoples we serve.”
‘Social And Industry Pressures’
An account manager at an advertising agency in the Midwest — who does not want to be named out of fear he will not be able to find a job — was terminated at the end of 2021 after failing to submit proof of vaccination.
Beyond a desire to wait for long-term safety information about the vaccines to come out, the account manager says he exercises regularly, eats right, and supplements his diet with vitamins. Until November of last year, his firm gladly respected his convictions and “did not have a vaccine mandate as a condition of employment” — even establishing a “flexible” policy that they claimed would allow unvaccinated employees to continue working remotely. “This policy upheld the right for employees to choose their vaccination status without putting their jobs in jeopardy.”
“Since I started my position,” the company “stood by its long-held principle of respecting each employee’s right to medical choice and bodily autonomy,” said the account manager. “Since the start of the pandemic, the company offered flexibility for people to work remotely if they chose to remain unvaccinated or simply wanted to work from home.”
After it became clear that an overwhelming majority of employees were vaccinated, the company “contradicted their policy for respecting individual medical choice and made it a requirement for employees to get vaccinated in order to keep their jobs.” Though President Biden’s vaccine mandate for private employers was not explicitly cited, “The timing of the company’s vaccination requirement seemed far too convenient as it came soon after the president’s now infamous speech.”
“The company kept loosely citing ambiguous ‘CDC recommendations’ regarding their vaccination protocols for employees,” the account manager continued. “Senior leadership claimed that the reason for the implementation of the new policy was because it gets everyone back together in the office — where productivity and collaboration are much better — and ensures the health and safety of all employees, at no point giving any consideration to employees who have natural immunity from previous infections.”
Why the shift? “By nature, the advertising industry is overwhelmingly hostile to conservatives … It’s my suspicion that much of the reasoning for the new and abrupt COVID-19 vaccination policy came from social and industry pressures — nothing that considered or respected the medical rights of employees.”
Though the company offered opportunities for religious and medical exemptions, the account manager had no explicit religious reason to refuse the vaccination. “I also have no known pre-existing conditions or comorbidities that would exempt me from the COVID-19 vaccine. I simply could not file an exemption and I was not going to lie about my exemption status. It also didn’t matter that I already had COVID-19 asymptomatically.”
The account manager is also a graduate student at a major university in a degree program that “is not cheap.”
“Losing my job will take away my ability to pay my bills while also paying for graduate school,” he explained. “Losing my job has also positioned me to indefinitely live with my family until I can find a new position and ensure a stable income to support myself.”
“I was quickly advancing in career, having only been out of undergraduate for a few years. With almost every major advertising agency in the United States and around the world now requiring some level of vaccination against COVID-19, it will make it very difficult for me to progress as an agency professional. I have started considering an industry shift to something that allows me to work in-person and remain committed to my beliefs in medical freedom.”
‘It Was A Political Move’
Jennifer Howle worked in the Kevil, Kentucky, offices of Four Rivers Nuclear Partnership — a contractor with the Department of Energy, and therefore subject to President Biden’s federal vaccine mandate. Howle was infected with COVID-19 in October 2020 and recovered; because she has natural antibodies and wanted to see long-term safety data, she decided against vaccination.
Howle chose to not file a religious exemption after she and her husband prayed continuously about the decision. In any case, Howle said that “employees who legitimately have health concerns were not able to receive medical exemptions,” as their form “had to be approved or denied by our on-site occupational physician — who had never seen some of these employees based on their job.”
“My personal belief is that it was a political move,” Howle said about Four Rivers’ application of the vaccine mandate. “If it was a legitimate health concern, they would have let as many of us that could telework continue to do so. We had several times that we were sent home for two weeks or more at a time because they ‘thought’ the numbers were going to rise … and after talking to several groups, they found themselves to be productive while teleworking.”
Howle’s job loss carried massive implications for her family; before she received a new job from a company that respects her medical decisions, she was forced to refinance her home and pick up side jobs for income.
“I pray that being terminated will not impact any future jobs. I served the company in full capacity until the day I was walked out.”
The views expressed in this piece are the author’s own and do not necessarily represent those of The Daily Wire.
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Source: Dailywire
