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Chief Executive’s Message – Friday 10 December

December 10, 2021

You will by now be very aware of the government announcement on Wednesday night to bring “Plan B” into effect to aim to slow down the transmission of COVID-19 and particularly the Omicron variant. I wanted to make it extremely clear what our response to this announcement is, so that you understand your responsibilities and have clarity of the guidance I expect you all to follow to help protect ourselves and others at this time.

1. Working on site

When we are working on site it is absolutely essential to ensure we adhere to our infection prevention and control (IPC) guidance which means wearing a mask at all times in shared spaces and keeping a distance of 1m+.The ONLY exception to this is when eating and drinking. I expect everyone to take responsibility for yourselves and challenge your colleagues and others who are not complying. We need to all work together to keep safe.

2. Work from home

Essentially, if you can work from home, please do so. We know that most of our clinical roles will require on site working on a full-time basis and your ability to continue attending on site to support colleagues and care for patients is greatly appreciated. I expect all managers to lead by example, working from home for some of their working week and to make an extra effort to keep in touch with team members who are working from home more frequently.

3. Face to face meetings

Any face to face meeting from Monday 13 December should be changed to a virtual meeting unless it is actually essential for this to be face to face (such as clinical huddles). 1:1 meetings are acceptable between colleagues who are on-site

4. Christmas get togethers

Regrettably, I must emphasise that there should not be any on site Christmas parties this year. We know there are risks of transmission when people meet together and it is easy to lose sight of our restrictions when socialising together. Please ensure that you don’t attend or arrange Christmas get togethers within our healthcare environments. Where you have work events outside of our premises please ensure that you are cautious and follow the national guidance. As NHS employees we have a duty to set an example and ensure we don’t put ourselves or others at unnecessary risk.

It is essential that we all follow this important guidance.  As our area’s main healthcare provider, we need to be the ones setting the example.

Thank you for your anticipated cooperation.