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Mealey's Coronavirus

  • April 29, 2025

    Magistrate Judge Rules On Discovery In EEOC, United HealthCare Vaccine Mandate Suit

    COLUMBUS, Ohio — A federal magistrate judge in Ohio ordered the Equal Employment Opportunity Commission to “work with” United HealthCare Services Inc. in narrowing down which details of a fired work-from-home employee’s medical records should be considered when they confer on outstanding discovery disputes in a lawsuit alleging that United violated the employee’s rights when it denied her a request for a religious exemption from its COVID-19 vaccine mandate and terminated her.

  • April 29, 2025

    COVID Glove Supplier Cross- Appeals After Court Affirms $100M Award In Its Favor

    FAYETTEVILLE, Ark. — A nitrile glove supplier on April 28 filed a notice of cross-appeal to the Eighth Circuit U.S. Court of Appeals after an Arkansas federal court denied Walmart Inc.’s motion for judgment as a matter of law or a new trial in a case in which a jury awarded the supplier more than $100 million against Walmart for reneging on a promise to purchase millions of boxes of gloves during the COVID-19 pandemic.

  • April 29, 2025

    Parties Agree To Dismiss; Challenge To $12M Verdict For Vaccine Refuser Dropped

    DETROIT — The parties filed a stipulation of dismissal with prejudice on April 28 in a case in which a Michigan federal jury awarded a former employee of a medical insurer nearly $3 million in compensatory damages and $10 million in punitive damages after finding the insurer liable for discrimination for failing to accommodate her religious objection to receiving the COVID-19 vaccine.

  • April 29, 2025

    Municipalities Sue HHS, CDC To Stop Termination Of COVID-Related Federal Grants

    WASHINGTON, D.C. —  A group of municipalities and a labor union filed suit against the U.S. Department of Health and Human Services, its secretary, the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention and its acting director seeking an order declaring that the termination of grants that were a response to the COVID-19 pandemic is unlawful and vacating the termination of the grants.

  • April 29, 2025

    Alaska Federal Judge Grants Insurer’s Motion To Dismiss COVID-19 Coverage Suit

    ANCHORAGE, Ala. — Following the Alaska Supreme Court’s answers to two certified questions in a coronavirus coverage dispute, a federal judge in Alaska on April 28 entered judgment in favor of an insurer after granting its motion to dismiss an insured’s breach of contract and bad faith lawsuit seeking coverage for loss of business income under the Communicable Disease Suspension of Operations provision in the insurance policy.

  • April 25, 2025

    Texas High Court Grants Agreed Motion To Dismiss Insurer’s Petition For Review

    AUSTIN, Texas — The Texas Supreme Court on April 25 granted a commercial property insurer and its insured’s agreed motion to dismiss the insurer’s petition seeking review of a lower court’s partial summary judgment order in a coronavirus coverage dispute, according to its orders pronounced.

  • April 25, 2025

    Panel: City Robocalls Announcing Virtual Town Halls During COVID-19 Not Illegal

    DENVER — A 10th Circuit U.S. Court of Appeals panel affirmed the judgment of a New Mexico federal court, which granted a city’s motion to dismiss in a lawsuit alleging that robocalls made by the city to inform residents that town hall meetings would be held virtually during the COVID-19 pandemic were a violation of the Telephone Consumer Protection Act (TCPA), ruling that the calls fall within the emergency purposes exception of the act.

  • April 25, 2025

    ER Doctor Whose Suspension For Refusing COVID Vaccine Was Upheld Seeks Rehearing

    PHILADELPHIA — An emergency room doctor on April 24 filed a petition for panel rehearing or rehearing en banc of a Third Circuit U.S. Court of Appeals panel opinion affirming the judgment of a Pennsylvania federal court, which granted summary judgment in favor of a hospital in the doctor’s lawsuit alleging religious discrimination and retaliation in violation of Title VII of the Civil Rights Act and the Pennsylvania Human Relations Act (PHRA) after the doctor was refused a religious exemption from a company-mandated COVID-19 vaccination and suspended.

  • April 24, 2025

    PPP Loan Recipient Seeks Final Determination On Loan Forgiveness From SBA

    FORT WORTH, Texas — A Paycheck Protection Program (PPP) recipient filed an amended complaint against its lender and the Small Business Administration (SBA) alleging wrongdoing on the part of the lender in arranging the loan and partly denying loan forgiveness and seeking a final determination on forgiveness from the SBA after the bank filed a motion to dismiss the company’s original complaint.

  • April 24, 2025

    Distiller Seeks En Banc Rehearing After NLRB Impasse, Terms Ruling Is Enforced

    WASHINGTON, D.C. — Hood River Distillers Inc. filed a petition for a rehearing en banc after a split District of Columbia Circuit U.S. Court of Appeals denied its petition for review of a National Labor Relations Board decision in a case in which the employer alleged that it reached an impasse while trying to negotiate a new collective bargaining agreement (CBA) and accused the union of engaging in delay tactics before and during the coronavirus pandemic.

  • April 24, 2025

    Shriners Employees Fired Over Vaccine Ask 5th Circuit To Rehear Claims Dismissal

    NEW ORLEANS — Several Shriners Hospital for Children employees who were fired for not taking the COVID-19 vaccine are asking the Fifth Circuit U.S. Court of Appeals to reconsider an earlier ruling dismissing federal and state claims against their former employer, arguing that the panel’s decision misapplied the law, violated the separation of powers doctrine and denied constitutional due process rights.

  • April 23, 2025

    U.S. Supreme Court Declines To Hear University Manager’s COVID-19 Vaccine Appeal

    WASHINGTON, D.C. — The U.S. Supreme Court denied a pro se petition for a writ of certiorari filed by a former University of Kentucky department manager after a Sixth Circuit U.S. Court of Appeals panel affirmed a summary judgment ruling for the university’s board of trustees in a dispute over a COVID-19 test-or-vaccinate policy.

  • April 22, 2025

    Former Employee Seeks Payment For Mandatory Pre-Shift COVID-19 Screening

    CHICAGO — A former employee filed a purported class action against his employer seeking to recover unpaid wages for mandatory pre-shift COVID-19 screening during the pandemic under the Illinois Minimum Wage Law (IMWL), the Illinois Wage and Payment Collection Act (IWPCA) and quantum meruit, contending that the time spent screening and awaiting screening was controlled by the employer and necessary to his job and, thus, compensable.

  • April 21, 2025

    Insured Seeks Coverage For More Than $50M In Losses Caused By Coronavirus

    GREENSBORO, N.C. — A limited partnership that owns and operates shopping centers containing outlet stores sued its primary and excess insurers for declaratory relief and breach of contract in a North Carolina court, alleging that the lawsuit is “necessitated” by the insurers’ failure and refusal to indemnify it for “tens of millions of dollars in losses” caused by the coronavirus pandemic.

  • April 21, 2025

    Resort Seeks Reduction In Fee Request After $133,000 Award To COVID Vaccine Refuser

    DETROIT — After a Michigan federal jury awarded $133,000 to a former employee of a resort, having determined that the resort failed to accommodate the employee’s religious beliefs that conflicted with getting the COVID-19 vaccine, the resort filed its response to the employee’s motion for $434,130 in attorney fees and costs, requesting that the court lower the award from the amount requested.

  • April 18, 2025

    Magistrate Advises Dismissal Of ‘As Regarded’ ADA Claim Based On Vaccination Status

    PITTSBURGH — Concluding that being unvaccinated for COVID-19 cannot be the basis for a perceived disability under the Americans with Disabilities Act (ADA), a Pennsylvania federal magistrate judge recommended granting the partial motion to dismiss of a pharmaceutical company in a former employee’s lawsuit alleging that the company failed to accommodate what it perceived as the medical disability of being unvaccinated and thus immunocompromised.

  • April 18, 2025

    Suquamish Tribe Opposes Insurers’ High Court Petition In Tribal Jurisdiction Dispute

    WASHINGTON, D.C. — The Suquamish Tribe in Washington filed an opposition to insurers’ petition for writ of certiorari asking the U.S. Supreme Court to determine “whether a tribal court can exercise jurisdiction over nonmembers of the tribe based on off-reservation conduct,” asking the high court to not disturb the Ninth Circuit U.S. Court of Appeals’ opinion that affirmed a federal court’s finding that a tribal court has subject matter jurisdiction over a COVID-19 coverage suit involving tribal properties on tribal land.

  • April 17, 2025

    COVID Vaccine Failure-To- Accommodate Claims Dropped Against Third-Party Evaluators

    CAMDEN, N.J. — A New Jersey federal court filed an opinion after earlier granting the motion to dismiss of a medical services provider and a physician in a lawsuit by an employment candidate alleging violations of the Americans with Disabilities Act (ADA), negligence and other claims in connection with an assessment of the employee’s medical history requested by the prospective employer after the candidate requested a medical exemption from a mandatory COVID-19 vaccination.

  • April 15, 2025

    Engineer To 4th Circuit: Affirm Ruling In Long COVID Disability Benefits Case

    RICHMOND, Va. — Contending in part that de novo review was correctly applied because of an “inexcusable failure to issue a timely decision,” a long-term disability (LTD) benefits claimant urged the Fourth Circuit U.S. Court of Appeals to affirm a judgment that she is owed past-due benefits because long COVID symptoms have disabled her from working as an engineer.

  • March 20, 2025

    Insurer To 4th Circuit: Overturn Ruling In Long COVID Disability Benefits Case

    RICHMOND, Va. — Arguing that the lower court improperly applied de novo review and wrongly concluded that the claimant showed that she is disabled from working as an engineer because of long COVID symptoms, an insurer urged the Fourth Circuit U.S. Court of Appeals to reverse a judgment that the claimant is owed past-due long-term disability (LTD) benefits.

  • April 15, 2025

    Panel: Title VII Does Not Require Allowing Unvaccinated ER Doctor To Work Onsite

    PHILADELPHIA — Finding that accommodating an emergency room doctor’s religious objection to the COVID-19 vaccine would be an undue burden on a hospital, a panel of the Third Circuit U.S. Court of Appeals affirmed the judgment of a Pennsylvania federal court, which granted summary judgment in favor of the hospital in a lawsuit alleging religious discrimination and retaliation in violation of Title VII of the Civil Rights Act and the Pennsylvania Human Relations Act (PHRA) after the doctor was refused a religious exemption from a company-mandated COVID-19 vaccination and suspended.

  • April 15, 2025

    Walmart Appeals $100M Award In Glove Deal After Trial Court Denies JMOL, New Trial

    FAYETTEVILLE, Ark. — Walmart Inc. on April 14 filed a notice of appeal to the Eighth Circuit U.S. Court of Appeals after an Arkansas federal court denied its motion for judgment as a matter of law or a new trial in a case in which a jury awarded one of Walmart’s suppliers more than $100 million for reneging on a promise to purchase millions of boxes of nitrile gloves during the COVID-19 pandemic.

  • April 14, 2025

    Judge: LTD Administrator Didn’t Abuse Its Discretion In Long COVID Case

    MADISON, Wis. — Upholding denial of long-term disability (LTD) benefits for a claimant who was diagnosed with long COVID, a Wisconsin federal judge said in part that “even when symptoms are subjective, functional limitations caused by those symptoms can be objectively measured, so it is not arbitrary and capricious to ask for objective evidence.”

  • April 09, 2025

    Judge Considers Subjective Evidence, Rules For Disability Claimant

    TACOMA, Wash. — A production line manager who points to receipt of a COVID-19 vaccine as the start of numerous symptoms that made him unable to work successfully challenged a disability insurer’s denial of his long-term disability (LTD) claim, with a Washington federal judge entering an April 8 judgment that he is entitled to relief including at least 24 months of benefits.

  • April 07, 2025

    Missouri Panel Partly Reverses Ruling In Insurer’s Favor In COVID-19 Coverage Suit

    KANSAS CITY, Mo. — A Missouri panel affirmed in part and reversed in part an insured’s breach of contract lawsuit seeking coverage for its losses arising from the coronavirus pandemic, finding that the court cannot hold that one of the insurers was entitled to judgment as a matter of law under its primary “all-risk” property insurance policy’s Pollution Contamination exclusion and the master policy's Mold, Mildew & Fungus Clause and Microorganism exclusion on the insured’s claims for loss of attraction coverage.