Tuesday, March 16, 2021
Vaccine Leave Law
On March 12, 2021, New York State Governor Andrew Cuomo signed into law legislation granting public and private employees paid leave time to receive the COVID-19 vaccine. The law is effective immediately and will automatically expire on December 31, 2022.
The law provides employees a paid leave of absence from his or her duties for a sufficient period of time, not to exceed four hours per vaccine injection. Because the law does not limit the number of times that employees may utilize this paid leave, employees may receive up to four hours of paid leave for a single vaccine injection and up to eight hours of paid leave for two-injection vaccines. Employees would also presumably be able to take the paid leave provided by the law, through December 31, 2022, in the event that additional booster vaccines are eventually deemed necessary to protect against COVID-19 variants or otherwise provide full protection against the virus.