CNN recently fired several employees for coming into the office without being vaccinated against COVID-19, the contagious disease caused by the coronavirus, reporters for the cable network said Thursday.
CNN President Jeff Zucker mentioned the firings in a memo to staff. Its contents were first published by a media reporter for The New York Times, and several CNN employees later shared excerpts online.
“In the past week, we have been made aware of three employees who were coming to the office unvaccinated. All three have been terminated,” said Mr. Zucker, according to The Times and CNN reporters.
“Let me be clear — we have a zero-tolerance policy on this,” Mr. Zucker continued.
“You need to be vaccinated to come to the office. And you need to be vaccinated to work in the field, with other employees, regardless of whether you enter an office or not. Period.” he said in the memo.
A spokesperson for CNN did not immediately respond to an inquiry from The Washington Times.
Several major companies have recently begun requiring workers to be vaccinated against COVID-19. Vaccines greatly lower the likelihood of a person becoming severely ill or dying from the disease.
Nationwide, 49.9% of the population is fully vaccinated against COVID-19, according to the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC). A person is fully vaccinated two weeks after the final dose.
About 30% of adults have not received a single COVID-19 vaccination, however. Public health officials have been urging holdouts to reconsider to help combat the coronavirus pandemic as the highly contagious delta variant surges throughout the U.S.
• Andrew Blake can be reached at ablake@washingtontimes.com.
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