Federal judge dismisses lawsuit from Texas hospital employees over COVID vaccine requirement

Nearly 200 employees at Houston Methodist were suspended without pay last week for their failure to get fully vaccinated, per the hospital system's requirements.Of the 178 suspended employees, 117 signed onto the lawsuit, which argued that requiring workers to receive the COVID-19 vaccines "requires the employee to subject themselves to medical experimentation as a prerequisite to feeding their families," likening them to "guinea pigs."U.S. district judge Lynn N. Hughes said in his ruling that claims that the vaccines are dangerous are "false, and it is also irrelevant." Hughes noted that Texas law "only protects employees from being terminated for refusing to commit an act carrying criminal penalties to the worker," and that receiving a COVID-19 vaccine "is not an illegal act."Hughes also wrote in his ruling that the hospital's requirement does not violate federal law or public policy, and took issue with the lawsuit comparing the requirement to get vaccinated with Nazi medical experiments during the Holocaust."Equating the injection requirement to medical experimentation in concentration camps is reprehensible," Hughes wrote.