What happens if a healthcare worker refuses the COVID vaccine?

On Tuesday, January 26 at 19:30 GMT:
A small but significant number of healthcare workers in several countries including the US, Germany and India are refusing to take a Covid-19 vaccine despite being at high risk for contracting and spreading the virus.

In the US, about three in 10 medical staff are hesitant to take a vaccine, according to a survey carried out by the Kaiser Family Foundation. The survey cited fear of side effects and distrust in vaccine efficacy as two driving reasons.

A study in Germany found less than 50 percent of nurses and just 73 percent of doctors planned to get vaccinated. In India, where the infection rate is the second-highest in the world, news of hesitancy among healthcare workers has prompted officials to call on them to fulfil their “social responsibility” by getting vaccinated.

In this episode of The Stream, healthcare workers from different parts of the world join us to discuss the importance of their colleagues taking the vaccine and tell us how they are advocating for them to do so.

In this episode of The Stream, we are joined by:
Syra Madad, @syramadad
Infectious disease epidemiologist
scty.org

Pauline Paterson, @DrPPaterson
Co-Director, The Vaccine Confidence Project
vaccineconfidence.org

Anant Bhan, @AnantBhan
Researcher, Bioethics, Global Health, Health Policy