Sir, – I am writing to highlight the injustice of allowing non-vaccinated healthcare workers care for elderly citizens in their own homes.
My parents are in their 80s living at home. My Mum has a carer coming in daily and the lady told her recently she is not vaccinated!
Over the past year and a half we have done everything we could to keep my parents safe. Not entering our family home, not allowing the grandchildren to visit their grandparents, doing all the shopping for my parents, and we find out now that while we were doing all of this there was an unvaccinated, untested person coming into our parents’ home daily that they were not aware of.
We are totally aghast that this can be allowed under HSE guidelines. Mandatory vaccination or daily testing for unvaccinated care workers should be compulsory. My parents have been put in a very awkward situation. My mother needs this homecare but if they do not allow this carer in to their home and ask for a different one they are not assured that the new carer is vaccinated either.
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I note now in a lot of countries in the EU, and in the US, healthcare workers are mandated to be vaccinated.
As a nurse myself I would never consciously put a patient in jeopardy due to my inactions and I do feel if healthcare workers choose not to be vaccinated that is their choice, but they then cannot work directly with the vulnerable in the community or within hospital or nursing home facilities.
I appreciate that our vaccination rate is very high but this scenario is affecting my parents daily and I am sure they are not the only ones.
– Yours, etc,
VALERIE O’CONNOR,
Portrane, Co Dublin.