Traverse City hospital tells employees get flu shot or get fired

Munson Healthcare has issued an ultimatum to its employees: Get the flu vaccine by Dec. 31 or lose your job.

The Associated Press reports Medical Center chief operating officer Kathleen McManus is pushing the issue because voluntary vaccination at the health system has never topped 65 percent.

“The people we serve here are very sick,” McManus said. “And I will not put a patient at risk.”

The flu is caused by a virus which can wreak havoc in patients with immune problems, the elderly and the very young.

But employees are pushing back on the mandate, the AP reports.

“I have a really hard time believing I’m going to be forced to do something against my will,” said nursing administrator Dianne Lopez-Wild, who works in an office. “It’s like something out of a sci-fi movie. It’s bizarre to me. It seems so unreal.”

And while employees might believe they are in a civil rights battle, the Courts have long held that mandatory vaccinations were acceptable. The question in this situation, however, is whether or not mandatory vaccination is acceptable without a concurrent outbreak of disease.