The US Supreme Court has confirmed that all nine of the court’s judges have received their COVID-19 booster shots, according to a report in the ABA Journal.

The court’s confirmation came amid a surge of the omicron variant across the US, and ahead of its hearing of in-person arguments on Friday (7 January) about two challenges to the Biden administration’s vaccine requirements for millions of workers.

One of the Biden administration’s policies before the US’s highest court requires workers at firms with more than 100 employees to have vaccinations or weekly COVID-19 tests.

‘Irreparable harm’

In a brief submitted to the court on behalf of the Biden administration, Solicitor General Elizabeth Prelogar said that the measures were necessary "confronted with the deadliest pandemic in the nation's history".

A group of 26 business associations opposed to the mandates, however, said that they would "inflict irreparable harm upon hundreds of thousands of businesses".

The second vaccine mandate applies to employees of federal health-care providers that receive federal funding. The requirement includes exemptions for religious and medical reasons.