Many of Minnesota’s top companies, largest employers already have COVID-19 mandates set

Many of Minnesota’s top companies and largest employers already have COVID-19 vaccination and testing mandates in place, following the news from President Joe Biden, who made an announcement Thursday on new federal vaccine requirements to curb the spread of the surging delta variant.

The expansive rules mandate that all employers with more than 100 workers require them to be vaccinated or test for the virus weekly, affecting about 80 million Americans. And the roughly 17 million workers at health facilities that receive federal Medicare or Medicaid also will have to be fully vaccinated.

Some of the largest employers and institutions in the state — Mayo Clinic, State of Minnesota, Fairview Health Services, Allina Health, University of Minnesota and HealthPartners — have already set mandates on vaccinations and testing. To see a full rundown of mandates in the state, click here.

KSTP reached out to some other employers, such as Wells Fargo, Target and UnitedHealth, to find out what’s next after the President’s announcement Thursday. All of them concluded that they were reviewing the update and have nothing new to share as of Friday.