(Radio Iowa) – The UnityPoint Health system is the latest to announce it will require employees to get vaccinated against COVID-19 .

UnityPoint says all employees in the 31 Iowa hospitals in its network are required to be vaccinated by November 1st, regardless of whether they provide direct patient care or not. President and CEO Clay Holderman says in a statement that “We believe this vaccination requirement will help keep our team members, patients, and communities as healthy as possible”

Those who are not vaccinated by the deadline will be asked to resign or be fired. The other large hospital network in Iowa, MercyOne, announced in July that they are requiring all employees to be vaccinated by September 21st.

A spokesperson tells Radio Iowa UnityPoint has 24,000 employees in Iowa.