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Julianne is an accomplished litigator and provides strategic counsel to clients navigating the ever-changing landscape of labor and employment law. She offers guidance on laws involving harassment, discrimination and retaliation; advises on leave issues under the Americans with Disabilities Act (ADA) and the Family Medical Leave Act (FMLA); and counsels on wage and hour compliance. She advises clients across a wide variety of industries, including the emerging cannabis and industrial hemp sector.

Throughout the COVID pandemic, healthcare employers have navigated the challenge of balancing safety concerns with employee requests for religious exemption from the vaccine.  Since lifting the stay of the CMS rule requiring certain healthcare workers to receive a COVID-19 vaccine, the US Supreme Court (Court) has refused to enjoin state and city vaccine mandates for workers who seek religious exemptions from such mandates. On March 7, 2022, the full Court rejected, without comment, an emergency application for an injunction that was previously denied by Justice Sotomayor to prevent enforcement of the New York City Department of Education’s COVID-19 mandate against suspended workers who refused vaccination based on religion.  In the wake of continued challenges to vaccine mandates based on religion, the U.S. Equal Employment Opportunity Commission (“EEOC”), released guidance on March  1, 2022 that addresses questions related to religious objections to vaccinations in the workplace. Healthcare employers should ensure that assessment of requests for religious exemptions for vaccine mandates comports with EEOC guidance.

For many healthcare employers, phase one and phase two COVID-19 vaccine deadlines are either here or quickly approaching. The Centers for Medicare and Medicaid (CMS), in an exercise of enforcement discretion, has begun monitoring covered CMS provider and supplier types for implementation of COVID-19 staff vaccination requirements in accordance with the COVID-19 Healthcare Staff Vaccination

Thursday, September 30, 2021
Live Webinar | 2:00 – 3:00 p.m. CDT

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Healthcare employers have been implementing vaccine mandates—hard mandates, soft mandates, and everything in between—for some time now. The religious exemption requests, however, are piling up. Join Husch Blackwell attorneys who have experience addressing the myriad issues involving religious exemptions, including federal law, state laws and “right of conscience” laws. Stick around for questions and answers and hear other human resources leaders in healthcare share their experiences.

On July 26, 2021, the White House issued a press release marking the 31st anniversary of the Americans with Disabilities Act and announcing the publication of new guidance and resources dedicated to assisting disabled individuals, including individuals with long COVID, which entails new or recurring symptoms experienced by some individuals infected with COVID-19 that can last for months after the individual is first infected, even if the initial infection was mild. Due to the “persistent and significant” health issues presented by long COVID, the Office for Civil Rights of the Department of Health and Human Services (HHS) and the Civil Rights Division of the Department of Justice (DOJ) published guidance to explain the application of federal disability laws to individuals suffering from long COVID. The federal government also published a compilation of resources, some of which apply to employers, regarding accommodations for workers suffering from long COVID.

On June 9, 2021, the Occupational Safety and Health Administration (OSHA) released its long anticipated interim final rule and request for comments for the Occupational Exposure to COVID-19; Emergency Temporary Standard (ETS). OSHA released the ETS one day after the approval of the standard was received from the Office of Information and Regulatory Affairs, Office

On Thursday, January 14, 2021, President Biden’s administration announced its proposed $1.9 trillion COVID-19 stimulus relief plan: “The American Rescue Plan” (“Plan”). The Plan contains wide-ranging support for those affected by the pandemic. Notably, the Plan proposes to require all employers of any size to provide paid leave and to significantly extend the required paid