To think free flu jabs for NHS admin staff is ridiculous??

[thisisjustridiculous]

My SIL is admin staff in the NHS, she has no patient contact and no real contact with medical staff, beyond half an hour a week.

She’s just got a free flu jab! AIBU to think this is disgusting? It must cost the NHS so much, admin staff should have to pay. I agree that frontline staff should get it for free to protect the vulnerable but admin staff shouldn’t.

Admin staff mix with the clinicians that treat patients and plenty of them go onto wards to even if they aren’t patient facing.

I used to work in a back office role in an hospital and regularly visited clinicians on wards including NICU & HDU, ate my lunch with them in the canteen, etc. The more staff vaccinated, the less flu can spread which ultimately protects the patients.

My pay was rubbish too (hence I’m not NHS anymore) so I wouldn’t have paid for one out of my own pocket, I needed that money for bills and food!

Well quite. I always tease DH (private sector) that he gets bonuses, corporate days out, big summer and Christmas events fully paid for and we get……….a flu jab!
Even the pension isn’t as great as it once was.

I suppose if we didn’t get the flu jab we could capitalise on the fabulous sick pay. Maybe that’d make the OP happier.

I've known police forces to offer this as well. Public sector don't get much in their worklife world. Let them benefit from this without bitching.

Is that a serious post?

You think they should be forced to pay?

Sorry. I mean why are you baffled that people want to be vaccinated to prevent flu?

And where's does the money for the jab go? Does it really reduce 'sick days'? You'll find ' common cold and flu' is in the same drop down box when managers are filling in sickness absence forms. Makes me question whose making money out of this

I assume you have never had flu, and by that i mean flu that floors you and comes on within an hour or so and knocks your legs out from under you. It's not a bad cold, it can be a full on incapacitating illness. I've only had it once and i was so ill I collapsed. Always got the flu jab when i was in the NHS,, because apart from not wanting to be ill myself I did not want to infect any of our patients, I'm a bit soft hearted like that! I'm old now and get it because flu made me really poorly in my younger days so i dread to think what it would do to me in my dotage.

You are being rather ridiculous

Most employers offer it for free.

Well this has been an interesting thread to read.

The vaccine

They use the same space as patients even if her job isnt patients facing. They use the same corridors and could pass the flu on in that way.

This has probably been pointed out already but you do realise that clinical and admin staff share massive open plan offices? If admin staff come into work with flu they are likely to
spread it to clinical staff. Some admin staff will actually be based in clinical areas - outpatient clinics (full of vulnerable older adults), ED reception and so on. Anyone working in the hospital is encouraged to get the flu jab, reduces staff absences & risk to patients.

She must work in a massive hospital if it has completely separate access doors, corridors, canteens, toilets, and rest areas for admin staff who are not patient-facing.

These have all been shared with all staff and patients in every hospital I've been in.

The jab doesn't stop transmission

what nonsense hospital out - patient appointments and a and e are overrun, its sheet volume that stops you getting care. I could not run my clinical teams without my admin colleagues and with winter approaching I want to do all I can to make sure my team are as well as they can be.

Can you tell me where it’s still £15 please? I’d love to know.

There are people who want everyone to get a particular work benefit, and those who think that if they dont have it, everyone who already does should lose theirs. It’s a mean way of thinking, and lacks imagination.

As 'well as they can be'? What If they all refuse the vaccine? What then?

And NHS staff aren't?

😂

Good one @thisisjustridiculous

Tell us another one, my sides are splitting!

Oh, and YABU of course!

It probably doesn't cost that much..

I'd be interested to know the statistics of the clinicians being vaccinated!

Agree with that. The clinic I attend every few months seems to have an average age of 80 and that’s taking me into account…

You don’t think someone has done an assessment of the cost of vaccinating staff vs the cost of flu related absence?
Often I think posters probably split opinions down the middle on mn; this is a rare case where you literally could not be more wrong (or bitter).