A recent survey of 12,000 nurses and other health care workers by the Professional Association of Nurses and Nurses (V&VN) shows that 37 percent plan to have themselves vaccinated when a properly tested corona vaccine is available. One in four healthcare workers indicates that they will not be vaccinated and about a third are still uncertain about it. This reports NRC.
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Healthcare workers are third on the government’s priority list, next to people over 60 and people who belong to a medical risk group. Yet there are many doubts. Reasons for these doubts include uncertainty about the vaccine’s safety and potential long-term side effects. The more people are immune, the less likely the virus is to spread. According to TU Delft, three quarters of the population must have had the coronavirus or been vaccinated against it in order to create group immunity.
Flu shot
This fall, 42 percent of healthcare workers took the flu shot. In previous years this was 33 percent. According to company doctor of the Amsterdam UMC Jaap Maas, this increase is because a greater awareness has been created by everything that happened this year. Yet here too there are doubts among healthcare workers about the effectiveness of the flu shot. Maas indicates that the flu shot is useful and that there is less dropout due to illness. If the readiness for the flu shot is an omen for the enthusiasm for the corona vaccine, then there are still a few things to change. According to Roel Coutinho, former director of the RIVM, the corona vaccine will not be mandatory. The V&VN professional organization says it respects every choice made by a nurse or carer.
By: Nationale Zorggids
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