Thousands of unvaccinated care home workers in UK set to quit

Thousands of unvaccinated care home workers in the UK look set to quit their jobs

With the new law coming into force next Thursday, November 11, that bans unvaccinated healthcare assistants and nurses from working in care homes, thousands of staff are expected to pack in their jobs.

Across England, according to official figures, there are currently thought to be around 60,000 care home workers who have not been jabbed against coronavirus. This is approximately 10 per cent of the available workforce.

As part of the Government’s effort to protect elderly and vulnerable care home patients – who even when double-jabbed can still contract the virus – the law that comes in on Thursday was approved.

It is believed that many of these workers will transfer to jobs in the NHS, and swap care homes for hospitals. This move is totally plausible since the same ruling for NHS staff has been pushed back to a later date, sometime next spring.

This has led to suggestions from bosses of care homes that if staff who care for vulnerable patients take positions in hospitals, then all that will happen is the potential threat of them simply passing the virus to vulnerable patients in hospitals instead.

“Unvaccinated staff are going to leave, and work in retail and hospitality, or go to the NHS, because they don’t need to have vaccinations to work there – which is robbing Peter to pay Paul”, commented Dr Charles Armitage on Friday 5. Armitage is the director of the National Care Force, a nationwide network that helps fill staff gaps for social care providers with health workers and volunteers.

Adding, “Then you suddenly get this influx of workers into the NHS who are unvaccinated and it just shifts the problem there”.

It is also claimed by Wade Newmark of The Dales Nursing Home in Exeter, that agencies are going to care homes and offering the workers up to £17 to quit their jobs and go and work in the NHS. In care homes, the wages are between £9 to £11 an hour, as reported by dailymail.co.uk.

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