BCAHA has had several inquiries from concerned member Auxiliaries about whether or not they should require all the volunteers to be vaccinated. Unfortunately there are not straight forward answers but BCAHA can make some recommendations for your Auxiliary.
If you have volunteers in a Healthcare Facility i.e. Hospital or Residential Care unit they are governed by your Health Authority. The question is more for volunteers in stand-alone sites like Thrift Stores.
BCAHA is recommending that you follow the rules issued by your Health Authority for all your volunteers regardless of which site they work in. Please contact your Volunteer Resources Manager or Administrative Office to have them issue their guidelines and post them.
- We also caution that you have a written protocol in place available to all your members.
- How you plan to collect this information.
- What you will require as proof of vaccination (The new Provincial QR code requires a device that can read the code)
- Ensure the confidentially of any information that you obtain.
- Are you able to offer off site jobs to unvaccinated volunteers – i.e. jobs they can do at home?
- Have a written statement for volunteers who are unwilling or unable to be vaccinated ie “any member who is not vaccinated be advised that they may have to step back until the Health Authority deems it safe for you to do so”
- If you have volunteers who are unable to be vaccinated for medical or religious reasons, we suggest consulting your Health Authority as to what the best solution is.
- Determine if you will allow volunteers with only the first dose to volunteer while waiting for the second does.
These are trying times and we understand that whatever policy you adapt will result in the loss of some volunteers but we need to ensure the safety of our volunteers to the best of our ability. On the uptick, we understand that since the Province brought in stricter vaccination rules the number of people booking appointments and gone up.
Better days have to be ahead.
BCAHA Executive August 2021
