04/30/2017 / By Ethan Huff
North Carolina Congresswoman Virginia Foxx, a Republican, has introduced new legislation that, taken to its logical end, might eventually provision for employers to force their employees to be vaccinated under the guise of “wellness.”
House Resolution 1313, known as the “Preserving Employee Wellness Programs Act,” contains certain provisions for “disease prevention” that, should employees refuse them, might end up costing them their jobs. That, or employees could face penalties in the form of ostracization or even higher insurance rates.
Based on the legislation’s open-ended language, employees could one day be refused the option of rejecting whatever their employers decide is appropriate for wellness and disease prevention, including government-recommended vaccines.
While an employee could petition his or her employer for a “reasonable alternative standard,” according to the bill, the Public Health Service Act is what actually defines this terminology — and this legal definition leaves wide open the possibility for employers to force their employees to abide by vaccination requirements set forth by the government.
“The concern is this bill if passed into law would be applied to penalize employees who do not get regular vaccines imposed by an employee wellness plan,” warns Health Impact News.
You can read the full text of H.R. 1313 at Congress.gov.
Despite being the main sponsor of the bill, Rep. Foxx isn’t necessarily its brainchild. Where the tricky language in H.R. 1313 actually stems from is the Patient Protection and Affordable Care Act, more commonly known as Obamacare. In it, provisions for implementing employer health promotion and prevention programs are outlined in further detail, as are the potential penalties for failing to abide by them.
As explained by Health Impact News, employer health promotion and prevention programs can already provide incentives and rewards for employee compliance, as well as “surcharges” and “penalties” for non-compliance. What are these penalties, you might be asking yourself? Higher insurance premiums, for one.
According to the text of H.R. 1313, employees who abide by their employers’ wellness guidelines, which may include compulsory vaccinations, can be awarded up to 50 percent off their insurance premiums. Employees who do not abide by these wellness guidelines, on the other hand, could end up paying 50 percent more than their vaccinated co-workers.
“H.R. 1313 is indeed a threat to anyone employed by a company or large organization that offers a ‘wellness’ program and partners with government and Pharma to ‘give carrots and apply sticks’ to employees who do or do not go along with government endorsed ‘standard of care,’ which includes receipt of federally recommended vaccines, whether the language in this bill says the word ‘vaccine’ or not,” warns the National Vaccine Information Center (NVIC).
NVIC is urging the public to contact their congressional representatives and two state senators to voice opposition to H.R. 1313. No employee should be forced to take vaccines in exchange for lowered healthcare premiums or other company perks, health freedom experts warn. This is medical discrimination at its most damning, and it can’t be allowed to become the standard.
You can also contact Rep. Virginia Foxx and let her know how you feel about this bill. Remember to be polite but firm in your opposition, explaining to her your concerns about where this bill could lead as an affront to health freedom.
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legislation, mandatory, vaccines
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