Hospital workers are surrounded by dozens of cases of people with the flu every day, but some of the hospitals don’t require that their employees get a flu shot.
“Our employees are not required to have a flu shot,” Cindy Wesley, Georgetown Community Hospital Assistant Administrator said. “It's not mandatory, but we highly recommend that our employees have a flu shot. It's best for their health and the protection of our patients.”
Employees at both UK Hospital and St. Joseph Hospital are also not required to have a flu shot. But if workers at St. Joseph opt out of the vaccine, they must then wear a mask around patients.
Central Baptist Church in Lexington said they do require any employees that have contact with the patients, even if it’s just breathing the same air, to have the vaccine.
People in Lexington had mixed reactions about whether hospital employees should be required to have a flu shot:
- “Because if it's as rampant this year as they say it is, then they have a responsibility to protect themselves as well as fellow employees and the patients that are there.”
- “It's a good thing, but it should be a choice because that's a basic human right… to have a choice, whether we get the flu shot.”
- “I think they're individual rights are some what abdicated by the right of the good of the people they're in contact with.”
