Dozens of employees fired for refusing COVID-19 vaccine file lawsuit against Rady Children’s Hospital

More than three dozen nurses and other employees at Rady Children’s Hospital San Diego have sued the medical center alleging they were wrongfully fired for refusing to be vaccinated against COVID-19.

The plaintiffs, who filed their case in San Diego Superior Court late last month, accused Rady Children’s Hospital of violating their religious freedoms, among other allegations, by issuing blanket terminations rather than judiciously considering applications for religious exemptions.

“The blanket denial to these employees fails to address any determination on the sincerity of the religious beliefs of these employees and fails to demonstrate any undue hardship giving cause for the refusal to accommodate,” the legal complaint states.

“The blanket denial to all employees requesting an exemption evidences an intentional disregard of the requests and clearly constitutes (a) violation of these employees’ rights under state law,” it adds.

The plaintiffs, a collection of 37 former employees who all were terminated after refusing the COVID-19 vaccines offered to them, are not seeking to be reinstated to their jobs. Instead the lawsuit seeks lost wages and benefits as well as punitive damages.

Those costs could reach into the millions of dollars.

Rady officials said Friday that they have a responsibility to protect patients, staff and others as best they can.

“Rady Children’s cares for a vulnerable patient population, many of whom have no option for vaccination,” the nonprofit hospital said in a statement. “We believe it is our responsibility to take necessary steps to help best protect the safety and well-being of the patients we serve.”

Hospital officials said they normally withhold public comment on lawsuits but this case prompted an exception to that policy.

“While it is the policy of Rady Children’s not to comment on pending legal matters, we are confident in and stand by our decisions regarding unvaccinated staff,” the Rady statement added.

State and federal public health officials for months have been urging people to get vaccinated against the novel coronavirus, which has claimed almost 800,000 American lives since March 2020 and continues to infect tens of thousands of people every day.

Many employers are requiring workers to be vaccinated — especially healthcare workers and others who work in congregate-living settings. Many mandates include some allowance for religious and other limited exemptions.

The complaint filed by the former Rady employees accuses the hospital of summarily disbelieving plaintiffs who say they oppose the vaccines on religious grounds.

“The sincerity of an employee’s stated religious belief is usually not in dispute and is generally presumed or easily established,” the lawsuit states. “Employers are not and should not be in the business of deciding whether a person holds religious beliefs for the ‘proper’ reasons.

“In fact, the law provides protection for sincerely held religious beliefs even when some members of the same religious organization, sect, or denomination disagree with the beliefs espoused by the individual,” the claim said.

Vaccine mandates have become political in recent months, with some companies and organizations insisting their workforce get immunized and others allowing people to instead submit to regular COVID testing.

Last week San Diego Mayor Todd Gloria and the City Council approved a mandate for all city employees, even as the Police Officers Association and others opposed the idea. About 700 of the city’s 1,900 sworn officers, 37 percent, remained unvaccinated after the city’s deadline; among them about 470 officers requested an exemption.

“The way out of this pandemic is through vaccines,” Gloria said, “and the city should lead by example.”

The complaint from the former Rady Children’s employees has been assigned to Judge Ronald Frazier. A hearing is set for May 2022.