Pregnant and undertaking home visits for work in lockdown

[Cabbie16]

I'm approx 6 weeks pregnant with my first. I work in Children's Services full time and have to visit children and families in their homes frequently (several visits a day). I have access to PPE but it is not possible to have 2m distance in homes and families do not wear PPE. I feel quite anxious about this, especially now we are in lockdown. I plan on telling my manager quite early so that a risk assessment can be undertaken but worry they will just decide PPE is sufficient.

Is anyone else in a similar role / position? How are you feeling about work during lockdown?

I was in a similar role and as soon as I told them they stopped me carrying out my normal duties. They managed to find a role for me (welfare phone calls) but they said if they couldn’t have, they would have had to furlough me.

Hi, I've been wondering about this too. I work in a similar role doing home visits, not for the local authority but for an organisation that has a service level agreement with them. I'm about 24 weeks so will request full time wfh, even though I find it boring and hard to sustain interest in work!

My work have been supportive up to a point, but feel I'm going to have to push for what I want in terms of safety, work adjustments etc.

Currently advised to wear a ask, have window open but in small 1 bed flats social distancing is not really possible.

Congratulations!!
I work in children's services, we have a standard pregnancy Risk Assessment, in addition to this we have Covid risk assessments that highlight pregnancy. In my LA pregnant colleagues have not undertaken home visits. I appreciate it's early and you might not want to share at this stage however there are other risks associated with undertaking home visits. I am not in a role where I do visits anymore but I told my line manager when I was 7 weeks, most people tend to inform the management team early so steps can be taken to support and protect them.

Thanks all for your replies. They have helped me to feel a bit reassured that I am not being too dramatic about everything. I agree there are additional risks with home visits that need to be considered too. I'm off work until next week when I'll be around 7 weeks so plan to tell my manager then. I worry that we are very short staffed and I'm in a statutory role so there will be pressure to 'work as normal'. I'm also suffering morning sickness all day too so not sure how I'll even manage visits and meetings currently!