umm...swines...

[trellism]

I don't want to be a pregnant princess (at 26+5) but one person in our office shares a house with a confirmed case of swine flu. Four members of the team (including her) now have temperatures and coughs and keep telling me how rubbish they feel.

Would it be terribly unreasonable to get signed off by the GP for a week before I catch the lurgy off them? They refuse to go home because they're too busy, apparently. I'm also asthmatic so getting the flu is never ever fun for me.

Can you ask to work from home? Or in a different office?

Probably already too late , just hope they are too ill to come in tomorrow.

I don't have the sort of job where I could work from home. They do..

Your boss should be telling them to stay away or does he want his entire work force off?!

YANBU to want to stay away from work in this situation, but you can't ask the GP to prescribe a pre-emptory sick note, can you? If you can, then go for it, although you are just as likely to catch flu in the supermarket etc etc as you are at work ...

I'd stay at home tomorrow and have a chat on the phone with your boss first thing. S/he really ought to be sympathetic to your situation; I can understand why you're worried.

Well, I couldn't get hold of my GP but I've spoken to my midwife and she tacitly suggested that staying home tomorrow wouldn't be a silly idea. My colleagues can suffer and get worse over the weekend and hopefully will either be off sick or better by Monday.

I don't know about the supermarket: I spend all day in an open plan office with these people so I probably am more likely to catch the lurgy from them.

Hope you're OK Trellism

Did you stay at home today Trellism?

Yes! I'm fine. Thank you

I chickened out of announcing on the phone that I didn't think my colleagues had been very nice and said I thought I might have a cold too.

I figure that by Monday they'll either be worse, and home, or better, and therefore resistant, and so what I'll have is a protective ring of resistant people around me for the 2 months till mat leave starts.

they are being very selfish. The advice states very clearly that if you have symptoms similar to SF quarantine yourself until better. This is why this bloody thing is sweeping the n ation. If people don't feel to bad they don't care about spreading it to others more vulnerable. Absolute wankers. Sorry.