Delta Air Lines jacks up health insurance premiums for unvaccinated employees



Beginning Nov. 1, unvaccinated Delta Air Lines employees will be charged $200 more a month for health insurance premiums as part of a company policy to curb costs associated with the coronavirus pandemic.

What are the details?

Delta CEO Ed Bastian made the announcement Wednesday in an employee memo in which he called the surcharge "necessary" in light of the "financial risk" that unvaccinated employees create for the company.

"The average hospital stay for COVID-19 has cost Delta $50,000 per person," Bastian noted before arguing, "This surcharge will be necessary to address the financial risk the decision to not vaccinate is creating for our company."

"In recent weeks since the rise of the B.1.617.2 variant, all Delta employees who have been hospitalized with COVID were not fully vaccinated," Bastian claimed.

In addition to the monthly health insurance surcharges, unvaccinated employees will also be required to wear masks in all indoor Delta settings "until community case rates stabilize" and will be subject to weekly COVID-19 testing.

Furthermore, starting in October, should an unvaccinated employee contract the virus, they will be forced to remain out of the workplace without COVID protection pay.

"Effective Sept. 30, in compliance with state and local laws, COVID pay protection will only be provided to fully vaccinated individuals who are experiencing a breakthrough infection," the CEO noted.

What else?

The changes are a part of what the executive called a "robust" response to the recent spread of the not-so-conveniently named coronavirus Delta variant. While the company has yet to institute a vaccine mandate for employees, this latest step is clearly an attempt to pressure employees to receive the shot.

Citing the U.S. Food and Drug Administration's granting of full approval to the Pfizer vaccine this week, Bastian said, "The time for you to get vaccinated is now."

"We can be confident that the Pfizer vaccine is safe and effective, and has undergone the same rigorous review for other approved medications to treat cancer and heart disease, as well as other vaccines," he argued. "If you aren't fully vaccinated, I strongly urge you to discuss the issue with your personal physician or health provider."

In May, Delta announced it would require that all new hires be vaccinated against the coronavirus, with some exemptions.

That same month one of Delta's competitors, United Airlines, announced that all 67,000 of its U.S.-based employees had to become fully vaccinated or risk losing their jobs.

Unvaccinated adults who previously had COVID-19 may face double the risk of reinfection compared to vaccinated adults: Study



Unvaccinated adults who have had COVID-19 possibly face double the risk of reinfection compared to vaccinated adults, according to a recent study from the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention.

What are the details?

The new study, which assessed the likelihood of COVID-19 reinfection in unvaccinated adults, found that unvaccinated people who have had coronavirus may be more than twice as likely to get infected again when compared to those who received a vaccine.

According to the New York Times, the CDC study "examined the risk of reinfection during May and June" among hundreds of Kentucky residents who tested positive for the virus in 2020.

The study, according to a Saturday Fox News report, was carried out as part of the agency's Morbidity and Mortality Weekly Report.

"Those who did not get vaccinated this year faced a risk of reinfection that was 2.34 times higher than those who did not get their [coronavirus vaccines]," the Times' Roni Caryn Rabin wrote. "The study suggests that for those who had overcome an infection, the addition of a vaccine offered better protection than the natural immunity generated by their original bout with the virus alone."

Rabin added, "The study's authors cautioned that much is still not known on how long natural immunity to the virus lasts and that genomic sequencing was not conducted to confirm that the reinfections were not simply flare-ups of the remains of the subjects' initial infections."

CDC Director Rochelle Walensky said that the data in the new study only reinforces the importance of vaccination against COVID-19 — even for those who had prior infections.

"If you have had COVID-19 before, please still get vaccinated," Walensky said Friday. "Getting the vaccine is the best way to protect yourself and others around you, especially as the more contagious Delta variant spreads around the country."

In July, Walensky said that the dangerous Delta variant is "spreading with incredible efficiency and now represents more than 83% of the virus circulating in the United States."

What else?

Fox News' Saturday report also pointed out a recent CDC study that "pointed to the success of the vaccines in preventing COVID-19-related hospitalizations among the highest-risk age groups" and noted that both the Pfizer-BioNTech and Moderna vaccines were 96% effective in preventing hospitalizations among adults ages 65 to 74 years.

Johnson & Johnson's vaccine, according to the same report, is 85% effective in that age group.