MANILA, Philippines — It would be illegal for employers to stop their workers from reporting to work because they refuse to get the COVID-19 vaccine, Labor Secretary Silvestre Bello III said on Saturday.
Bello said the Department of Labor and Employment had not received any complaint about a company or employer implementing a “no vaccine, no work” policy, but he would issue an advisory on Monday reminding employers that they could not force workers to be vaccinated.
“That would be illegal. You cannot force a person to be vaccinated if he does not want to, and more so, you cannot make it a condition that he must be vaccinated before he could report for work,” Bello said at an online briefing. He noted that the Employers Confederation of the Philippines said it would not implement such a policy.