ALL healthcare workers, including doctors and nurses, along with the other staffers of the St. Joseph Mercy Hospital, have, to date, been fully vaccinated.

This is according to the hospital’s Chief Executive Officer (CEO) Enoch Wayne Gaskin, who, on Tuesday, on the sidelines of an event, stated that 100 per cent of the hospital’s staff members have received their jabs against the novel coronavirus.

Gaskin noted that, since the beginning of the pandemic, the hospital has had a hands-on approach in protecting its staff and patients.
“From the commencement of the pandemic, this institution took a leadership role in educating our staff, implementing systems to protect our staff and clients. We had screening, adequate signage [and] volunteering to do presentation to organisations,” he said.

Gaskin noted that the hospital rolled out a series of education and sensitisation programmes to keep the staff informed as information was made available about the pandemic.

“When the vaccine became a reality, we started educating our staff about the vaccine, even though we weren’t sure when we will get it. As information became available, through the World Health Organisation (WHO) primarily, and from the Ministry of Health, we kept our staff abreast,” he said adding: “Vaccines came and we were a little forward.

We alerted our staff to the reality that vaccination will become mandatory. Even before anything, we were proactive, we were honest with our staff and we utilised all the resources available to educate them.”

The CEO stated that while there were some hesitations to the vaccine, the hospital provided both medical support and counselling to its staff and their immediate family.

“There was massive hesitation [but] we provided medical support and counselling. This hospital has a pastoral council; we have a certified priest who is also a psychosocial counsellor and we have social workers. So whatever peculiar circumstances, there was a specialist and this was not only provided to the staff but relatives of the staff,” he said.