Hampshire Police officers joins calls for colleagues to get Covid-19 vaccine
John Apter wants to see frontline officers bumped up the priority list.
Last updated 8th Jan 2021
There have been calls over recent weeks for emergency services staff to be included in the high priority list for people to get the Covid-19 vaccine as it's starting to be rolled out.
Serving Hampshire officer and Chair of the Police Federation, John Apter, has now added his voice.
He says so far, the push for police to be higher up the list have fallen on deaf ears.
But Mr Apter thinks a perfect storm is brewing:
"If they're not given the vaccination because of the role they carry out, then we do have a risk that there will be more and more police officers who will not be able to do the job that's expected of them and that will create a vulnerability."
The Police Federation Chair says some forces have reported as many as 15% of their staff being off sick or self-isolating as a result of coronavirus.
He also says that having to police the latest lockdown is also putting a lot of pressure on frontline officers:
"This is absolutely not about elbowing the most vulnerable people in our society out of the way so that police officers can get ahead in the queue. It's not about jumping the queue for our NHS colleagues. Clearly there's got to be a prioritisation, but police officers must factor somewhere."
As things stand, there's no mention of emergency service workers on the vaccine priority list.
The top 6 categories for getting the jab are:
- Residents in a care home for older adults and their carers
- All those aged 80 and over, and frontline health and social care workers
- All those aged 75 and over
- All those aged 70 and over, and clinically extremely vulnerable individuals
- All those aged 65 and over
- All individuals aged 16-64 with underlying health conditions which put them at higher risk of serious disease and mortality