UI Health, which includes University of Illinois Hospital on the city’s West Side, will require its employees to get COVID-19 vaccines, the system announced Wednesday.

       The announcement came the same day the University of Illinois system said it would require faculty and staff to be vaccinated by the start of the fall semester.

       Medical technologists prepare samples for the saliva-based Covid-19 test at the Molecular Pathology Laboratory at University of Illinois Hospital in Chicago on Friday, Dec. 11, 2020. UI Health, which includes University of Illinois Hospital, said Wednesday it will require its employees to get COVID-19 vaccines. (Zbigniew Bzdak / Chicago Tribune)

       In requiring shots, the health system joins a growing number of hospital systems across the state and country mandating the vaccines for workers. Loyola Medicine and University of Chicago Medicine made similar announcements in recent weeks.

       UIC faculty and staff are being asked to disclose their vaccination status through an online portal by Aug. 1. People who request and receive exemptions will be required to undergo weekly, on-campus COVID-19 saliva testing and quarantine if exposed to someone who has tested positive for COVID-19.

       For UI Health workers, some aspects of the mandate’s implementation will be different, and details were expected to go out on that Wednesday.

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