Unvaccinated NHS staff in England urged to have Covid jab before deadline

Dominic Raab has urged unvaccinated staff in England to come forward for their Covid jabs, despite calls for the deadline to be extended.

The deadline for healthcare workers in England to have two doses of Covid vaccine is 1 April and they need to get their first dose by 3 February to avoid losing their job.

The looming deadline for mandatory vaccinations has led to warnings that more than 70% of the health service could be lost at a time when the service is under severe pressure.

The health service was more resilient than it was in 2020 and there was no need to delay the deadline, according to Raab.

He said that they would continue to call for those to be boosted or vaccined before the deadline. We have to make sure that we don't have people putting patients at risk if they aren't vaccinations. The deadline is there to protect the most vulnerable in our hospitals, but we have got the resilience because we have more doctors and nurses than we did in 2020.

There were protests in Glasgow, Manchester, and Leeds on Saturday and in central London on Saturday. The vaccines are not compulsory for health or care workers in Scotland and Wales. There will be a public consultation on the issue.

A Department of Health and Social Care impact assessment found that 73,000 staff in the National Health Service in England could be lost as a result of the policy. Mark Drakeford, the Welsh first minister, told the radio station that they wouldn't be looking for staff who lost their jobs in England.

Several health organizations called on ministers to delay the deadline.

The policy should be delayed to prevent staff shortages, according to the Royal College of GP. Martin Marshall, the chair of the Royal College of GPs, said compulsory vaccination for health professionals in England was not the right way forward.

The chief executive of the Royal College of Nursing said the policy would backfire if it was not delayed, while Danny Mortimer, the deputy chief executive of the NHS Confederation, said its members wanted more time to encourage and persuade hesitant staff to get. Some frontline staff will have to leave their jobs if they refuse to be vaccine free by the deadline.

Saffron Cordery said that the organisation did not believe a delay was the answer. A survey of trust leaders found that a majority of them supported a policy of mandatory vaccinations as a means of protecting staff from cross-infection.