Should Alabama healthcare workers get flu vaccines?

There is a growing debate around the country and even here in Central Alabama about healthcare workers being forced to get flu vaccines. 

Some area healthcare workers don’t have a choice when it comes to taking the seasonal flu vaccine.

Brookwood Hospital officials call the seasonal flu vaccine a condition of employment.  If refused, a panel will decide on the employee’s future on a case-by-case basis. The H1N1 vaccine is not mandatory.

Other hospitals are strongly encouraging the practice and may reassign employees if the employee doesn’t take it.

Brookwood Hospital may be the only local hospital making seasonal flu shots mandatory… but Samford’s Moffett School of Nursing students must also get both the seasonal flu and H1N1 vaccines. 

Samford nursing student Kylie Coyne said, “I mean it’s probably a good idea, we have to be in the hospital with sick patients all the time so, might as well.“

The school wants to protect not just patients but its students as well. Samford’s Moffett School of Nursing’s Dr. Jill Cunningham explains why a nurse or doctor might be hesitant.

Cunningham said, “I think one of the issues with the flu vaccine is that it is seasonal and you have to get it every year and that’s way more of an issue. Also with the new H1N1 vaccine with it being new on the market and hasn’t been out there very long.“

As for the pros, Dr. Cunningham points to the highly contagious nature of both flus.

Dr Cunningham said, “This is a way to certainly not only protect the healthcare but certainly protect those patients that are coming to the hospital to get well.“

Healthcare workers may also refuse a shot based on religion, egg allergies and neurological conditions.

While other hospitals around the country have also made it mandatory for employees to get the seasonal flu vaccine, New York is the only state which changed the law to make it mandatory.