Concern over increasing case numbers
Since the beginning of June, with the emergence of the Delta variant of concern, Napo has continued to closely monitor developments in England, Wales and Northern Ireland. Officers and Officials are currently receiving updates at least once a week from the National Official (Health and Safety) which provides analysis on the changing picture of the pandemic across different regions and devolved nations.
This information helps inform our regular discussions with the various employer engagement mechanisms regarding service delivery and assessment of risk, including the twice weekly NPS recovery meetings which also generates NPS position statements.
Across many of the services, responsibly for adjusting service delivery has moved from a centralised to regional approach. It is therefore vital that Napo Branch reps are consulted on and engaged with any localised changes and that risk assessments take account of those local circumstances.
Branches should contact their Link Officer and Official if they experience any issues with this.
Should you have any safety concerns about any activities you are requested to undertake, we would encourage you to raise this with your line manager and contact your local Napo representative.
Support for Vaccination
Whilst we understand and are sensitive to the fact that not everyone is currently able to have a vaccination, getting vaccinated can play an important role in helping individuals reduce the risks of becoming seriously ill or dying from COVID-19. For this reason, we would encourage our members to take up the offer of a vaccine.
However, based upon current data, Napo remains firm in its stance that someone’s vaccination status should have no bearing in relation to any of the risk control measures used by employers and we will continue to oppose any attempts to do so.
Returning to the workplace
Advice remains that wherever possible, people should work from home where they can. We will be working with employers in the coming months to consider how best to protect staff should this advice change, if it does, we will be expecting employers to continue to act with caution including not having all staff in the office at the same time with a mixture of home working and in person attendance.
Workplace Exposures
There remains an issue in the way some employers are recording and reporting potential workplace exposures to SARS-CoV-2 resulting in someone developing COVID-19. Within the NPS this resulted in Napo, UNISON and GMB raising concerns directly, however despite an internal review, these concerns remain to be addressed, with HMPPS who continue to suggest that there was no incidence of workplace virus transmission in HMPPS. This is simply not credible given the severity and number of outbreaks in HMPPS workplaces. As a result, a further joint response has been issued stating that the unions “reserve the right to take these concerns outside the agency to seek redress."
It continues to say;
“However, in the interests of continued joint working on this issue, we invite you to reconsider your position and to re-examine jointly with the unions:
• the specific NPS workplace outbreaks of covid over the course of the pandemic
• the sickness absence records for the respective outbreak workplaces
• any clusters of covid sickness in particular workplaces”
We would advise members that if you developed COVID-19 and believe you have reasonable evidence of any incidence as to why it was “more likely than not” that the workplace was the source of exposure to coronavirus, as opposed to general societal exposure, you should ensure that this was recorded and if you have not already done so, report it via your employers Accident reporting system.
Long COVID
The term ‘long COVID’ is being used to describe signs and symptoms that continue or develop after someone has had COVID‑19. It includes both ongoing COVID‑19 symptoms and post‑COVID‑19 syndrome. Currently evidence suggest that as many as 25% - 30% of those who have had COVID-19 continued to experience ill health symptoms for 12 months or more.
This is an area where Napo will be working to understand how this, and the application of workplace policies might impact upon members going forward.
More information about Long COVID can be found in a recent Napo magazine online article here
And the recently published TUC Report on Long COVID here
Workload and Work-Related stress
Excessive workload and other demands continue to affect a significant number of members across all the areas where members work.
In an effort to bring further pressure on employers to address these issues, we have recently produced new guidance for members on the steps that should be taken. The guidance available here, highlights the importance of individuals reporting incidence of stress as a work accident / ill health event which helps provide statistic data of the issues, reinforcing the message being delivered both locally and nationally about the scale of the problem.
In the next few weeks, we will also be launching Napo’s online stress survey and would ask members to share this widely with colleagues, as this will help generate addition data that can be used in conjunction with the accident reporting data.
Health and Safety Advice
Members are encouraged to raise issues locally and seek advice from their branch in the first instance. This is because branches are best place to have the knowledge and engagement mechanisms to address issues in a quick and often informal manner. To support branches where further advise is required, a new email address for Health and Safety has been set up hands@napo.ork.uk