Phoenix Children's Hospital was hit with a class-action lawsuit after the hospital listed the names of 368 employees exempt from its COVID-19 vaccination mandate in an Oct. 15 email to staff.
Two Phoenix Children's employees filed the class-action lawsuit Oct. 25 on behalf of all the individuals whose vaccination exemption status was disclosed, according to the complaint.
The complaint alleges that Phoenix Children's employee and physician relations office sent an email to 368 people that disclosed which employees had received a medical or religious exemption to its vaccination mandate. Additionally, the list of employees has been posted to social media and circulated beyond the original email copy, the lawsuit states.
The plaintiffs accused Phoenix Children's of invasion of privacy by publicly disclosing private information as well as negligent disclosure of medical information.
Phoenix Children's told Becker's on Oct. 29 that the list of vaccine-exempt employees was inadvertently included in the hospital's email informing employees of workplace accommodations to protect staff, visitors and vulnerable patients.
"In the process of communicating internal safety protocols related to such accommodations, the employee distribution list for one email message was inadvertently visible, instead of blind carbon copying the recipients," Phoenix Children's said. "Since learning of our administrative error, we immediately informed affected employees of the error, extended our sincere apologies and explained that efforts had been taken to avoid similar mistakes in the future."