When your hairdresser/beauty therapist/osteopath refuses the vaccine ...

[Roasegarden21A]

Firstly, I just want to say I don't believe in pushing people into having vaccines. It has to be a willing choice. I do personally believe in the effectiveness of the vaccination project and I want to be safe and I want my family to be safe. What would you do if a long standing therapist that comes into very close physical contact with you (and many others) is an anti vaxxer? I'm talking about people that are outstanding at their jobs. Would you keep going to see them?

The covid vaccine is brought in to stop people getting very sick and overwhelming hospitals not to end the pandemic. People who have been vaccinated can still get and spread covid it just makes the symptoms less severe.
It is not the magic talesment that people are holding it up to be.

This anti vax is ridiculous we have never had a vaccine that everyone has had to have before and the government can't force people to have it because we have and uphold the right to
BODILY AUTONOMY.

However they are using people like the op to do their dirty work for them and shame and coerce people into having the vaccine.

If we loose body autonomy it's a slippery slope downward.

For the record I am not anti vax. I am fully vaccinated, but people have the right to choose.

I can’t see how I would know. But yes, I would, unless they were annoyingly vocal about it, eg I don’t want to have my hair cut while someone rants about how vaccines can kill or whatever.
But I won’t be checking the vaccine status of people and would be perfectly happy to get my haircut without knowing whether the hairdresser has been vaccinated.

If I was your therapist I would find it extremely rude that you were asking about my (confidential) medication or vaccine status, I wouldn’t want you as a client anymore.

It is annoying. First time back in the salon the other week and a few of the staff were talking about not taking it - worrying about long term impact not being known, a load of fake news stuff basically. I also suspect that many beauty staff were continuing to work and do home visits during lockdown based on what someone let slip. Probably not enough to make me stop using them, but I felt a bit resentful about giving a tip given that it wasn’t the nicest salon experience

I wouldn't ask someone the question. But if they were advertising the fact, I might want to consider the situation. I am not sure that there is a straight yes or no answer to this. I have had both my vaccines, but that doesn't make me invincible. I can still contract Covid and I can still contract flu (for which I have also had the vaccine). I am technically considered clinically vulnerable, but I am a long way off ever having been overly bothered about covid - cautious, sensible but not wildly hysterical. But someone who is in close proximity to lots of people, and is prepared to catch and transmit Covid, that would have to give me pause for thought. They clearly don't care about giving it to me, and with the vaccine I would probably only get a mild case, but that isn't guaranteed. But what about their clients who can't have the vaccine - are they making sure that those people are able to make an informed choice about whether they wish to continue as customers. Informed risk has to go both ways.

And I think it would also, to me, depends on the nature of the job / service they were offering. I know that the local mobile hairdresser is anti-vax, and 95% of her patients are over the age of 60, many older and in various states of ill health. And she has not told her clients or their families - a few of us know because she walks her dog in a local park and won't bloody shut up about the vaccine. Personally, I think her clients have a right to know and choose for themselves. And no, in their shoes I would not have her in my home or cutting my hair. But I am not as vulnerable as many of her clients, so right now it wouldn't bother me - but it would bother me if it was my elderly and frail relative.

Did they volunteer this information or did you have the impertinence to quiz them?
But what's the point of asking here? Guess it depends whether you value the service they provide above your paranoia? How do you manage in shops? Who knows the status of the last person who used the self-check-out!
@mrsknottschicken Do dogs get Covid?

If someone asks me if I e had the jab I tell them it's none of your business

Totally weird

Bet you never asked these people if they had the flu jab? Thought not.

@roguetomato

bumbleymummy, but the whole point of vaccine is not for an individual person's gain, but for the society. So, "I don't need to take it because I'm low risk" is a selfish way to see it, imo. End I don't think anyone needs to take vaccine if they don't want to, but wish they own it and realise that people may see such people in different light.

No, the point of the vaccine is to protect the individual person from serious illness/death. We only found out recently that it helps to reduce transmission as well.

I actually see the ‘for the greater good’ people in a far more negative light than I see anyone who exercises their right to personal choice over whether or not to have a vaccine.

@bloodywhitecat

It wouldn't worry me but it does worry me that there will be a two tier, divided society, the 'clean' and the 'unclean'.

Obviously I can’t speak for others but I’ve had people blatantly excluding me and my dd over periods when restrictions have been relaxed over the last year because I worked in a hospital (non-clinical). Tbh I could see their point if they’re risk assessing.

My point is people can choose to do/not do what they like and if that creates a ‘two tier’ system then I don’t like the alternative of forcing people into situations they’re not comfortable with. At the moment people can take as much or as little risk as they like and if the people they wish to have contact with aren’t on the same page they’ll all have to accept that or find a way to make it work .

I actually see the ‘for the greater good’ people in a far more negative light than I see anyone who exercises their right to personal choice over whether or not to have a vaccine

It’s rarely that black and white though is it? Extremism at either end is off putting.

The point of the vaccine isn't just to protect individual person. It's to reduce the pool of susceptible people so that the illness won't spread easily.
And in the pandemic situation, "for the greater good" do help individual people too. One way or another, we need to get herd immunity to get out of this mess. It's not really logical to chance the virus to spread while wanting pre covid life back.

My hairdresser is no longer working in London due to Covid 19 and I am looking for a new salon which is following Government guidelines as set out. Can anyone recommend a hairdresser/salon in Wandsworth at all?

I've been trimming my own hair but am not in need of professional help! Thanks.

If you know they're an anti vaxxer then presumably they talk about this stuff a lot? If that's the case then I would stop going as it would annoy me.

I won't go to a beauty therapist until I've had both of my jabs anyway, because I assume I won't know whether or not they have had theirs. I wouldn't ask and wouldn't expect them to shout about it.

Once I've had both of mine I'll be happy to take the risk.

I would not ask but if I found out no I wouldn't use them. There are people unable to take the vaccine and all of us that can owe it to them to get vaccinated and protect them. And if we all refused we'd still be locked away and no one would be going anywhere.

There are people unable to take the vaccine and all of us that can owe it to them to get vaccinated and protect them.

Do you get the flu vaccine every year?

No I wouldn't use them, and actually it wouldn't matter whether they chose not to have the jab or simply couldn't. Given the choice I'd just prefer to be treated by someone less likely to give me covid, which right now means someone vaccinated.

If covid rates end up right down at almost none then the difference between a vaccinated and unvaccinated hairdresser will be less relevant, so I probably won't care eventually. If I was choosing tomorrow, I would care.

I care just as much about ventilation though (the other v word) so would also be choosing a therapist based on the premises. I think a lot of businesses still think that staff in masks and lots of hand gel is protective of their staff and customers, when finding a way to have their front and back doors or lots of windows open all day would make a much bigger difference.

I feel the same way about masks, in that if I couldn't (not just wouldn't) wear a mask, I'd feel I had to try hard not to be in indoor public places at this stage of the pandemic, if it wasn't essential for my job or some other unavoidable reason.

I'm much less interested in why someone doesn't/can't get vaccinated or wear a mask than I am in how they mitigate for that in their interactions with other people, to keep the risks down for everyone involved.

Do you get the flu vaccine every year?

Yes.

And flu is potentially serious for the older and the more vulnerable, which is why it is freely available to them every year, even though (a) humans, even the vulnerable, have a higher degree of natural resistance to flu on account of it usually not being a novel virus and (b) flu is nowhere near as dangerous to people as Covid currently is.

I have very little doubt that at some point in time, what we now know as Covid will probably be no more serious than flu currently is to us. But you need to remember that flu kills thousands every year, and a "very bad flu year" can easily result in 40-50,000 associated deaths in the UK alone. We have to learn to live with it unless it conveniently dies out like Spanish Flu did. But that doesn't mean that right now, at this moment in time, we should be putting the most vulnerable at risk of something with heightened morbidities.

But I do think there is a balance that has to be struck. If your frail and elderly mother lives in a care home, are you absolutely fine with someone working in physical contact with her who is refusing to be vaccinated against a virus that might be asymptomatic in the worker, but could kill your mother?

I am not in favour of forcing people to have a vaccine that they do not want. But there are many examples of occupational requirements that we accept simply because they exist; and right now when we have so many people vulnerable to a virus that is new to us, perhaps we do need to consider that some occupations or types of contact do need to be conducted by vaccinated people. Yes, people should have the free choice to take the vaccine or not. Shouldn't vulnerable people have the same right to make decisions about their lives? And shouldn't employers who are legally responsible for employees and clients also have the same right?

I honestly don't know what the "right" answer is, but it is nowhere hear as black and white as people want it to be. There simply isn't a "yes" or "no" answer to this matter. But ignoring it won't make it go away.

And as for those worried about the two tier society - we have plenty of tiers in society already. One more is irrelevant. But may actually be more necessary than some of the ones we happily live with all the time.

No I wouldn't use them, and actually it wouldn't matter whether they chose not to have the jab or simply couldn't.

My hairdresser isn't old enough to have been vaccinated last time I went. I'm not going to stop seeing him due to something completely outside of his control. It would be different if he started spouting crap about the vaccine being dangerous etc., I would reconsider then but not being offered it isn't his fault.

I'd wonder what other science and safety they reject and conclude in taking my business elsewhere.

Moondust001, great post.

What hairdressers who don't want the jab have learned from this thread is... Lie. Just tell fibs.

Covid can still be passed on from a fully vaccinated person!!

@Remmy123

Covid can still be passed on from a fully vaccinated person!!

People seem to forget or dont realise this. I think it will become much more apparent once Autumn and Winter come once more.

Also, there must be about 4 million people like me, who have already had Covid.
The chances of our group getting it again, seem to be very small.

It’s quite strange because I believe the younger people should have a free choice because up to now the risk of serious illness has been low . ( although I personally know a 26 year old who was very ill and has on going problems )

But when when one of my colleagues said she was not having the vaccine as she is too frightened and it’s not legally compulsory before she goes back to work , I did feel irritated . I said of course she has a choice but in my head I was thinking she does have an increased chance of acting it and passing it on and I don’t have full protection even if I have had the vaccine .

So my voice was saying one thing but in my head I was internally judging .