Highland NHS board members yesterday debated tactics on how to encourage all NHS staff to take up the flu jab this winter.
The members were in agreement with ‘positive encouragement’, rather than compulsion to try and get everyone working across NHS Highland to take up immunisation.
Area Clinical Forum chairwoman Margaret Moss said: “It’s not just about those who have contact with patients, evidence points to advocating this for everybody, and we should all take responsibility.”
The board rejected the idea of making non-immunised staff wear face masks, with board medical director Rod Harvey suggesting a badge declaring an individual had had the vaccination might work better.
Dr Gaener Rodger said if children were all being asked to take the vaccine, there was little excuse for board members to refuse.
She said: “It’s not inconvenient to have the jab. It’s low impact. We can begin by all board members getting it done.”
Board nurse director Heidi May said it was also a question of empowering people to ask others if they’d had the flu jab.
She added: “We know that the best way to encourage staff is to go out there with a trolley and a nurse to administer the vaccine on the spot.”
The only dissenting voice came from Mull councillor Mary-Jean Devon, who said she had never taken the vaccine and chose not to.
