Alaska Airlines says it will require all of its employees to get vaccinated against COVID-19, citing President Biden's vaccine mandate for federal contractors

An Alaska Airlines plane taking off at JFK.

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• Alaska Airlines has told staff they need to get the COVID-19 vaccine, reversing its earlier stance.
• The company explained it's a government contractor, so the federal vaccine mandate applies to it.
• The deadline for Alaska Air's roughly 22,000 workers to be vaccinated may be as early as December 8.
• See more stories on Insider's business page.

Alaska Airlines has announced a COVID-19 vaccination requirement for all of its employees.

The carrier told staff Thursday that they'll need to get vaccinated against COVID-19, as The Seattle Times previously reported. Alaska Air is adopting the mandate in accordance with President Biden's executive order requiring employees of federal contractors to get vaccinated.

"Since our company does significant work for the federal government, we have determined that Alaska Airlines, Horizon Air and McGee employees - all part of Alaska Air Group - do fall under this federal vaccine mandate, along with other major U.S. airlines," the company said in the announcement, which Insider viewed. " This means all of our employees, including certain contractors and vendors, will be required to be fully vaccinated, or be approved for a reasonable accommodation such as medical conditions or religious beliefs that prevent them from being vaccinated."   

Alaska Air said the deadline for all of its roughly 22,000 employees to be vaccinated could be as early as December 8.

The company is also extending its deadline for employees to get $200 for uploading proof of vaccination. Workers will now have until December 1 to take advantage of the incentive, compared to the previous deadline of October 15.

The announcement of the airline's vaccine mandate follows news that a similar mandate from United Airlines proved very effective in getting workers vaccinated. In early August, United became the first US airline to require that all of its employees get the COVID-19 vaccine. As of Tuesday, more than 99% of its 67,000 US employees had gotten the shot, according to the carrier. The airline then said it would fire the 593 employees who refused to comply with the mandate. However, many of these workers had gotten the shot but simply didn't upload proof of vaccination on time, United later said. Once these employees faced termination, nearly half of them uploaded proof, and the number of non-compliant workers subsequently fell to 320 people.

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