Biglaw

Vaccine Mandates Are Trending Across Biglaw Firms

Shots in arms to keep lawyers and staff safe from Delta's harms.

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We keep saying that the times we’re living in now are “post-pandemic,” but that seems to be far from the truth. COVID-19 continues to rage on across the United States, and the Delta variant now accounts for about 93 percent of all coronavirus infections in the country. Biglaw firms are now getting serious about prevention and protection, and many are now mandating vaccines for all.

Thus far, the firms that have made vaccination a requirement for those returning to the office include Akin Gump, Arent Fox, Clifford Chance, Cooley, Crowell & Moring, Davis Polk, Davis Wright Tremaine, Dickinson Wright, Fenwick & West, Fried Frank, Goodwin, Hanson Bridgett, Hogan Lovells, Hueston Hennigan, Lowenstein Sandler, McDermott Will & Emery, Mintz, Paul Weiss, Reed Smith, Ropes & Gray, Sanford Heisler, Schiff Hardin, and Weil Gotshal. Now, we can add another two firms to the list. Norton Rose Fullbright and Patterson Belknap have both added a vaccination mandate to their safety protocols.

Patterson Belknap seems to have been ahead of the curve when it comes to vaccination requirements for its workforce, announcing that as of early last month (July 6, to be exact), everyone who entered the firm’s office “must be fully vaccinated subject to medical or religious accommodations under applicable law.”

Norton Rose will be limiting U.S. office access to those “who are fully vaccinated.” Although the firm is sill planning to return to its office in September, it will be “continually monitoring the situation and evaluating this timeline.” NRF’s vaccine requirement is new as of this week, in response to “a dramatic increase in COVID-19 cases among unvaccinated individuals.”

Will your firm be changing its plans when it comes to vaccination for attorneys and staff thanks to the Delta variant? Please let us know. The more information is out there, the more likely it is that firms will be able to establish a market standard for a return to the office.

As soon as you find out about the reopening plan at your firm, please email us (subject line: “[Firm Name] Office Reopening”) or text us at (646) 820-8477. We always keep our sources on stories anonymous. There’s no need to send a memo (if one exists) using your firm email account; your personal email account is fine. If a memo has been circulated, please be sure to include it as proof; we like to post complete memos as a service to our readers. You can take a photo of the memo and attach as a picture if you are worried about metadata in a PDF or Word file. Thanks.

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Staci ZaretskyStaci Zaretsky is a senior editor at Above the Law, where she’s worked since 2011. She’d love to hear from you, so please feel free to email her with any tips, questions, comments, or critiques. You can follow her on Twitter or connect with her on LinkedIn.

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