Covid vaccinations to be made compulsory for care home staff

Biscuitmuncher I agree. Unfortunately, many people have listened to the scaremongering in the media, believed this government, and fallen for it all. For a virus with a 99% RECOVERY rate.

PinkCakes those who are immune compromised have the highest chance of catching the virus even after vaccine, because it is less effective for them. Very sick people in nursing homes are therefore still vulnerable after vaccine.

Hes just after publicity.

Grannygravy13 The man who owns Pimlico Plumbing has the right to choose who to employ, but he went further by saying that unvaccinated people should not be allowed in shops, etc., and they shouldn't be allowed out on the streets at all! The man is a moron.

Can anyone answer this - if the vaccine protects the vulnerable/elderly residents in care homes, why do the staff need to have it? The staff, who work 12 hour shifts, wiping and washing people, caring for the dementia sufferers, some of whom are aggressive, all for often Minimum Wage.

Seems to me that working in a care home is pretty much minimum wage work and now they're being forced to have vaccines they dont want. No ones going to want to work in these places. What worries me is where does all this end. The government has done such a job on terrifying people your all willing to accept anything. Wake up for pities sake

Doodledog

I've heard of people getting discretionary sick pay, which I can only imagine being horribly divisive and causing more problems than it solves, but I think it is legal.

As for the vaccine being compulsory for care workers, I have posted before about when my son was born and we had a very distressing experience because a member of staff was not vaccinated. My son was briefly in SCU, as his birth was very difficult, and one of the SHOs had lied about having had the TB vaccination. The doctor was from abroad, and had contracted TB before coming to the UK. My son, along with all the other babies who had been in the SCU were recalled to hospital for X rays, blood tests and prophylactic medicine. He was just days old, and it was very distressing.

I would not wish that on anyone, or on their parents or children. It really has made me hardline when it comes to vaccines, which works against my natural 'live and let live' outlook.

In the NHS, you cannot have "discretionary sick pay" What you get is "special circumstances paid leave"

I am working with one at the moment green lady, in her forties.

Are you saying that residents must be vaccinated as well. Have I missed that. Any care home that insists on that is not one I would want my relatives in.

I would be very surprised if there are many (any) medically exempt people who are physically fit enough to do care work. People still have the choice to be vaccinated or not....but as we know all choices have consequences.

I do not think medically exempt people should be allowed to work in care homes. For care homes, in fact for all care and health facilities, it should be vaccinated staff only.

We tie ourselves in knots over the the 'poor things, it is not their fault, they are being discriminated against' to ludicrous extents these days. Anyone working in a care or health facility should be vaccinated against COVID and flu. End of.

DH was in hospital just before Christmas, heart attack and bypass surgery, while he was there he picked up a hospital based infection. It was probably while he was in theatre itself as the centre of infection was the incision and the lung that was deflated during surgery. It was a fairly rare infection but it required 3 more operations and his survival was not guaranteed.

These things can happen, even in world class cardiac units with the highest of standards, but to actually have people working there who are not vaccinated against quite serious diseases and who can pass them round and kill patients,with no one allowed to stop them, defies belief.

What matters most the self determination of the health staff on whether to have a vaccine or not or the lives of patients, who have gone into hospital, generally, to be cured of one illness, only to be killed another introduced into the hospital by those meant to be healing them.

To say that all the residents will be vaccinated is a cop out. If vaccination is compulsory for those in care facilities then it should be for carers/nurses/doctors too. Remenber the medically exempt are probably more likely to be vulnerable and in care homes or hospitals because of those vulerabilities. so need to be protected.

I think one of my rights as a citizen is not to have my elderly relatives (or myself) put at risk by people who are supposed to be caring for them. I would have thought it was a given that any one working in medicine or the care sector should have all necessary vaccinations.

A local care home near me had 43 residents last year. It was a small well run home and the residents were 'like family' to the staff. The home took all precautions, extra cleaners etc and all was fine was the first 8 months of the pandemic. Then on december 6th, during the morning covid testing one nurse tested positive for covid. 3 days later 33 of the residents had the disease, within 3 weeks 14 of them had died. It was absolutely devasting for the families and staff. In addition 54 of the 68 employees tested positive so the home was run on a skeleton staff. That is was all inadvertantly caused by one nurse with covid. I know the vaccine wasn't available then and residents and most staff are vaccinated now but all care home workers really must be vaccinated.

This is a very difficult moral question I feel, balancing our rights as citizens not to have medical treatment that we do not wish to have, and the rights of those being treated by carers. As I understand it, many occupations have medical requirements such as eye tests, fitness, hearing, etc, so I have come to the conclusion that the rights of the clients and care home owners to have staff who are compliant and safe over rides the right to refuse vaccination.

Alegrias1 I agree with your post.

MerylStreep also raised a good point regarding insurance, many people have what is known as Critical Health Insurance, could be tricky if you had declined the vaccination and caught Covid with ongoing critical conditions? Would the insurer have the right to refuse to pay-out?

Using the example of teachers' needing to be TB free, it wasn't a requirement for pupils to have had a chest X ray, so there's a precedent. I guess the point is that teachers/care workers are providing a service, which should be exemplary.

Galaxy

Surely it is then the right of every member of staff to refuse to care for a person who is unvaccinated.

Not necessarily. Obviously, all who can be vaccinated should be encouraged to do so but there may be some who can't be. It is far easier for a member of staff to don PPE to protect the resident than it would be for a resident to do so to protect the member of staff. It may mean the hygiene guidelines have to be followed more closely for such members of the community but I am sure, if we deal with all the people involved as human beings, a way can be found.

I'm sorry to repeat myself but I'm going to anyway.

If people who are medically exempt from the vaccine are allowed to look after care home residents, then why is it such a big deal that other people who are not vaccinated will be able to look after care home residents?

The medically exempt could still catch COVID; they could still pass it on to the residents. Should these people also be required to find another job?

Under ordinary circumstances I would defend those who are anti vaccine. However these are not ordinary circumstances, we are in the middle of a global pandemic!!!!!
If health care workers refuse the vaccine then they must look for work elsewhere. Only those who are deemed exempt by a medical professional should be excused. Never thought I would hold this view but this but vaccination is so important. I would like to see it offered to all children too. This virus is mutating as we all know and is still with us and likely to remain so. I have surprised myself with how strongly I feel about this.

In the US, they have been offering 'inducements' to be vaccinated. Would our Prime Minister consider that? I wouldn't put it past him!

I fully support this decision. I don't really see what all the fuss is about. Either you have the vaccine and continue to work in the care sector or you refuse and get a job elsewhere. As previous posters have stated it's commonplace for health care staff to be vaccinated for other diseases, so why is this any different?

I’d like to hear some of the conversations going on ( behind closed doors ?) Re Insurance companies.

Exactly Galaxy.
If the staff have to be vaccinated then surely the residents should be... and the visitors.
And how often?

This is why it's a slippery slope.

At present I think only surgeons have to be vaccinated against hepatitis B - for others (such as doctors and nurses) it may be recommended but isn't compulsory.
I'm prepared to be wrong here - but don't think I am.

The only nearly-compulsory medication in this country appears to be fluoride which isn't everywhere yet.
I suppose you could avoid it if you wanted to by buying bottled water (which might have the "other" fluoride in of course).

It should be compulsory unless you have a doctors certificate stating why it is medically not advisable that you are vaccinated.

A few years ago I used to volunteer at an wildlife rescue centre. There were certain areas we were not allowed access to unless we'd be inoculated against rabies because there MAY be an injured bat receiving treatment. They usually had just a couple of bats per year, if that, and its far harder to get rabies than covid, but we all happily complied because it was a requirement of the job.

Caring for vulnerable people cannot be done at a safe distance. No jab, no job.

Surely it is then the right of every member of staff to refuse to care for a person who is unvaccinated.