THE LEAKING of a memo sent to managers of a Dublin hospital about preparations for a swine flu outbreak has been described as unnecessary and a potentially damaging distraction by the State’s largest trade union.
Siptu said the leaking of the information to the media would “only alarm” staff at Tallaght hospital. The trade union said it was “hard to understand” why the document had been disclosed.
RTÉ last night reported that Tallaght hospital had requested that all staff who were pregnant, severely obese or had chronic conditions or HIV inform the hospital’s occupational health department in case of an outbreak of the H1N1 swine flu virus.
The leaked memo said the hospital needed to identify staff that had an increased risk of severe influenza complications if they became infected with the virus and that it wanted to undertake a risk assessment.
The hospital said the response to a previous request for this information last month had been poor.
Tallaght hospital chief executive Michael Lyons told RTÉ the hospital had a duty of care to employees and had to ensure that there was a sufficient number of staff available to care for patients.
Paul Bell, Siptu’s Dublin health services branch organiser, said shop stewards at the hospital were unaware of the memo and that leaking it to the media “was a very unusual way to conduct business”.
“It defies logic to understand why this was done,” he said.
“We have not been consulted and we would expect to be consulted about any occupational health survey or other major initiatives in the normal way. Containing swine flu is a serious issue and needs to be dealt with expeditiously and sensitively.”
Mr Bell said the union had no knowledge of any previous attempt to gather information at the hospital to prepare for a swine flu outbreak and that he would be urgently seeking a meeting with hospital management.
“Hopefully this is not a case of someone trying to push a particular agenda and not interested in having input from staff on the ground,” he said.
Attempts to contact Tallaght Hospital for a comment last night were unsuccessful.
