---
type: "Bill"
title: "AN ACT TO AMEND TITLE 16 OF THE DELAWARE CODE RELATING TO INFLUENZA IMMUNIZATIONS."
description: "This bill provides flexibility for nursing and assisted living facilities to make hiring decisions contingent on staff influenza vaccination status."
jurisdiction: "us/states/de"
legislature: "Delaware General Assembly"
session: "151"
identifier: "SB 253"
citation: "Delaware SB 253 (151)"
classification: ["bill"]
subjects: []
status: "enacted"
primary_sponsors: ["David Bentz", "Sarah McBride"]
version_count: 1
action_count: 7
vote_count: 2
first_action: "2022-03-22"
last_action: "2022-06-14"
source: "openstates"
source_identifier: "ocd-bill/2b8f0581-4e3c-4e8a-8b22-a88fe0fe6bb0"
source_url: "https://legis.delaware.gov/BillDetail?LegislationId=79256"
source_hash: "04f6abfb89caef29534cdf112bc7a1c93e9e87bfc9467e82ab6aa94c0bde5b06"
vintage: "2026-07-01"
source_snapshot: "https://data.openstates.org/daily/2026-07-01/public.pgdump"
retrieved_at: "2026-07-06"
confidence: "reported"
tags: ["legislation", "bill", "us-de"]
---

# Delaware SB 253 (151) — AN ACT TO AMEND TITLE 16 OF THE DELAWARE CODE RELATING TO INFLUENZA IMMUNIZATIONS.

This bill provides flexibility for nursing and assisted living facilities to make hiring decisions contingent on staff influenza vaccination status.

## Version chain

The bill's text revisions, in order — the diff chain from filing to enrollment.

1. **Bill Text** (committee substitute) — [source](https://legis.delaware.gov/json/BillDetail/GenerateHtmlDocument?legislationId=79256&legislationTypeId=1&docTypeId=2&legislationName=SB253)

## Votes

- SM — **20–0** (pass) · upper
- SM — **32–7** (pass) · lower

## Sponsors

- David Bentz — primary (person)
- Sarah McBride — primary (person)
- Bruce C. Ennis — cosponsor (person)
- Bryan Townsend — cosponsor (person)
- Debra Heffernan — cosponsor (person)
- John L. Mitchell — cosponsor (person)
- Kendra Johnson — cosponsor (person)
- Krista Griffith — cosponsor (person)
- Laura V. Sturgeon — cosponsor (person)
- Paul S. Baumbach — cosponsor (person)
- Stephanie L. Hansen — cosponsor (person)

## Timeline

The legislative action history — every referral, reading, and vote.

- **2022-03-22** Introduced and Assigned to Health & Social Services Committee in Senate `introduction, referral-committee`
- **2022-04-06** Reported Out of Committee (Health & Social Services) in Senate with 3 Favorable, 1 On Its Merits, 1 Unfavorable `committee-passage, committee-passage-favorable, committee-passage-unfavorable`
- **2022-05-03** Passed By Senate. Votes: 20 YES 1 ABSENT `passage`
- **2022-05-04** Assigned to Health & Human Development Committee in House `introduction, referral-committee`
- **2022-05-11** Reported Out of Committee (Health & Human Development) in House with 8 On Its Merits `committee-passage`
- **2022-05-17** Passed By House. Votes: 32 YES 7 NO 2 ABSENT `passage`
- **2022-06-14** Signed by Governor `executive-signature`

## Source

OpenStates / OpenCivicData bulk snapshot [2026-07-01](https://data.openstates.org/daily/2026-07-01/public.pgdump); origin `ocd-bill/2b8f0581-4e3c-4e8a-8b22-a88fe0fe6bb0`. Confidence: reported (aggregated from official Delaware legislature records).