Cranston dentist who defied RI COVID vaccine mandate sues for right to see patients again

PROVIDENCE — The Cranston dentist who publicly defied the state's COVID-19 vaccine mandate for health-care workers filed a federal lawsuit Friday to force the state to let him see patients while remaining unvaccinated.

Stephen Skoly, an oral and maxillofacial surgeon who had been barred from practicing since Oct. 1, sued the state in U.S. District Court arguing that the state violated his constitutional right to due process and equal protection under the law by failing to grant him a medical exemption to the vaccine mandate.

Skoly argues that he has natural immunity from COVID because he has already been infected by it.

Skoly, chairman of the Rhode Island Center for Freedom and Prosperity, an organization that supports free-market policies, was denied an exemption even though the state "has awarded hundreds of related exemptions to various healthcare professionals," the center said in a news release.

Read more: https://www.providencejournal.com/story/news/local/2022/02/04/dentist-defied-rhode-island-covid-1-vaccine-mandate-health-workers-lawsuit/6650356001/