From LifeSiteNews

By Clare Marie Merkowsky

‘They should have been offered the option of an unpaid leave of absence and must, therefore, be reinstated as Quinte employees if that be their wish,’ Ontario arbitrator James Hayes said.

Nine Ontario nurses fired for refusing the COVID shot could be reinstated thanks to a new ruling.

On February 28, Ontario arbitrator James Hayes ruled in favor of nine nurses, represented by the Ontario Nurses’ Association (ONA), who were fired by Quinte for refusing to take the experimental COVID vaccine.

“They should have been offered the option of an unpaid leave of absence and must, therefore, be reinstated as Quinte employees if that be their wish,” Hayes wrote.

“Nurses intent on remaining unvaccinated are a small minority everywhere but their employee rights may not be ignored,” he added.

Quinte Health, which oversees Belleville General Hospital, North Hastings Hospital in Bancroft, Prince Edward County Memorial Hospital in Picton, and Trenton Memorial Hospital, required all employees to be fully vaccinated against COVID-19 beginning in September 2021.

Under the new policy, Quinte’s employees were expected to provide proof of receiving their first dose by October 1, 2021 and the second dose by October 31, 2021.

Staff who refused the experimental shots faced automatic termination, resulting in nine nurses being let go in 2022, and one was fired after returning from parental leave in 2023.

According to an emailed statement from Quinte Health, the policy was enforced “as an important measure to protect health-care workers, prevent transmission, maintain health-care capacity, promote public health, and fulfill our ethical obligation to prioritize patient safety and well-being.”

Susan Rowe, vice president of people and strategy at Quinte Health, claimed that the decision to fire the unvaccinated nurses was due to recruitment concerns while admitting that Quinte Health had 100 job openings across its hospitals.

“If we did not terminate, we would have to hold positions for people and could only backfill those on a temporary basis,” she testified. “It would have been challenging to recruit … and retain individuals with temporary roles.”

She further explained that Quinte Health did not place the nurses on unpaid leave because “we did not foresee any short or mid-term change for a vaccine requirement.”

Despite the vaccine mandate, hospital statistics from Quinte Health “indicated that of the 335 staff infections between April 2021 and March 2022, only 60 were between April and December 2021. The other 275 (and likely some of the 60) were with a fully vaccinated workforce.”

After the arbitrator’s ruling, Quinte Health announced that it “respects the arbitrator’s ruling and will work with our ONA partners on next steps.”

“Hopefully, the ruling will lead to more hospitals abandoning their vaccine mandates,” an Ontario nurse told LifeSiteNews under the condition of anonymity. “Considering the nursing shortages across Canada, it would be amazing if more nurses could return to work.”

A recent Health Canada memo revealed that a shortage of 90,000 doctors, nurses and other front-line healthcare workers has caused a “health worker crisis” in Canada.

As a result of the healthcare worker shortage, wait times to receive care in Canada have increased to an average of 27.7 weeks, causing some to despair and end their lives via euthanasia rather than wait for treatment.

Currently, vaccine mandates for healthcare workers are still in place in many jurisdictions across Canada despite a critical staff shortage in many hospitals. While some provincial governments have lifted their mandates, a number of hospitals still require the experimental vaccine as a condition of employment.

Additionally, a recently unveiled survey found that a significant number of Canadian healthcare workers, including most nurses, were hesitant to take the experimental COVID shots and only did so because it was mandated across the sector.

However, many healthcare workers have refused the vaccine and are appealing the mandates. In November, hundreds of British Columbia healthcare workers joined together to sue Provincial Health Officer Dr. Bonnie Henry for ongoing COVID shot mandates preventing them from working.

Similarly, Ontario pro-freedom Dr. Mark Trozzi plans to appeal after he was stripped of his license for critiquing the mainstream narrative around the COVID-19 so-called “pandemic” and the associated vaccines.