Health staff ‘pressured to return to work early after contact with Covid’
HEALTHCARE staff who are selfisolating are coming under pressure from managers to return to work before their full 14-day period is over, putting patients and staff at risk, unions have claimed.
Under the HSE’s ‘derogation’ policy, health workers can come back early after a risk assessment and if they are deemed essential.
The Irish Nurses and Midwives Organisation (INMO) and Forsa have raised concerns that there is not enough oversight of the policy at a time when cases of Covidrelated illness among healthcare staff has reached almost 10,000.
However, the HSE insists that the system isn’t leading to increased case numbers, saying ‘there is no evidence to suggest this is causing outbreaks’.
The INMO has said there is pressure on staff to return to work from managers due to low staffing levels and that the derogation isn’t being tracked appropriately.
According to the HSE’s Winter Plan, it is expecting ‘increased absenteeism and anticipated doubling of occupational health management referrals due to post Covid-19 fatigue’. It also anticipates around 2,000 staff per month will be referred for assessment, testing and contact tracing.
In the week from October 26 to November 1, some 532 healthcare workers were reported as close contacts of a Covid-19 case and would have been advised to restrict their movements for 14 days. Not all of these close contacts occurred in a healthcare setting.
INMO director of industrial relations Tony Fitzpatrick told the MoS: ‘It is simply not acceptable for members to be called into work before their isolation period is completed.
‘It puts at risk not only their own health but that of their colleagues and their patients, and it also puts the staff under enormous psychological pressure.’
In response to queries from the Irish Mail on Sunday, the HSE said: ‘There is no evidence to link the derogation policy to outbreaks among healthcare workers.
‘Following a detailed local risk assessment, some essential healthcare workers were derogated to remain in work, with additional twice daily monitoring and risk mitigation measures in place.’
There is no additional testing and tracing system in place for staff who return from self-isolation early, and they would undergo a day one and day seven test like any other member of the population. Mr Fitzpatrick said: ‘We are seeing high numbers of infections among nurses and long recovery periods as well as a very significant mental health impact on staff. The workforce planning needed over the next few months needs to take this into consideration, so we don’t have to rely on potentially sick and infectious staff members returning to work before they are ready.’
The INMO’s main issue with the HSE’s derogation policy lies in the provision that allows managers to derogate healthcare workers who are close contacts to return to work in the event that they are considered essential staff.
The monitoring of this policy has only been introduced in the last six weeks. The HSE’s clinical lead of the HSE Workplace Health and Wellbeing Unit, Dr Lynda Sisson, told the Medical Independent, that derogations are ‘necessary’ but that it will now be monitoring it ‘much more closely’ than it had been.
The INMO is critical of what the HSE defines as monitoring: ‘It is our information that many healthcare workers are derogated to return to work with a policy that directs monitoring which is entirely impractical and unimplementable.
‘A case in point involves rosters for night duty where managers are not in place, staffing levels that are so chronically low that monitoring is not practically applicable and there is no system other than temperature checking to determine whether or not the healthcare worker who was a close contact is developing symptoms.
‘It is simply too high a risk to introduce a derogation of this nature.’
Head of health for Forsa Éamonn Donnelly said the union fears derogations are being used in significant numbers. Fórsa accused the HSE of ‘insufficient national governance’ on the practice, saying: ‘As a result, there are no reliable statistics on the numbers granted, where they are in place, or links between derogations and the spread of the virus among staff and others.’
‘No system to check if staff develop symptoms’