Skip to main content

Get the COVID-19 booster shot, Apple reportedly tells staff

Apple has reportedly told its store and corporate employees to get the COVID-19 booster shot or face frequent tests for the virus.

“Due to waning efficacy of the primary series of COVID-19 vaccines and the emergence of highly transmissible variants such as Omicron, a booster shot is now part of staying up to date with your COVID-19 vaccination to protect against severe disease,” Apple said in a staff memo seen by The Verge.

Recommended Videos

It added that once a store worker of corporate employee is eligible to receive a booster shot, they will have four weeks to do so. If for any reason they are unable or unwilling to get the booster. then a COVID-19 test will be required prior to entering the workplace starting February 15.

According to information posted by the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention, those who had the Pfizer-BioNTech or Moderna vaccine are eligible for a booster shot five months after their second shot, while those who received the one-dose Johnson & Johnson shot can receive the booster two months after they were vaccinated.

Apple also said in its memo that anyone yet to receive any COVID-19 vaccine will be required to provide a negative COVID-19 rapid antigen test before entering the workplace. This measure starts on January 24, though the memo was reportedly unclear about whether this is the case for both corporate and retail workers.

Like other companies, Apple has been constantly adjusting its work practices throughout the pandemic, including introducing a work-from-home policy for office staff and adjusting operating hours for its global network of retail stores. In the early days of the pandemic in 2020, when cases were climbing rapidly in the U.S. and beyond, Apple shuttered all of its stores for several months before gradually reopening them again. When it did so, the company introduced new measures for staff and shoppers such as temperature checks and a request for everyone to wear a face mask.

At the current time, most of Apple’s corporate staff are still working from home, with its new rules applying to the few workers who are currently showing up to its offices.

Digital Trends has reached out to Apple for confirmation on its latest vaccination policy and we will update this article when we hear back.

Trevor Mogg
Contributing Editor
Not so many moons ago, Trevor moved from one tea-loving island nation that drives on the left (Britain) to another (Japan)…
Apple and Google to help states create COVID contact tracing apps
contact tracing app covidwise home screen

-Apple and Google are creating a new software framework that states can use to more easily create COVID contact-tracing apps, which could help states to build and deploy apps that would otherwise take much longer and more effort to set up.

“As the next step in our work with public health authorities on Exposure Notifications, we are making it easier and faster for them to use the Exposure Notifications System without the need for them to build and maintain an app,” Apple and Google said in a statement. “Exposure Notifications Express provides another option for public health authorities to supplement their existing contact-tracing operations with technology without compromising on the project’s core tenets of user privacy and security.”

Read more
FDA gives special authorization to speedy COVID-19 test
fda gives special authorization to speedy covid 19 test abbott laboratories binaxnow

 

The U.S. has received a boost in its efforts to conduct more COVID-19 tests after the Food and Drug Administration (FDA) granted emergency use authorization for a kit made by Abbott Laboratories.

Read more
Apple preps more store reopenings ahead of new iPhone launch
Apple store Japan

 

Apple is preparing to open more of its retail stores that were shuttered over the summer due to the coronavirus pandemic.

Read more