Reykjavík’s Landspítali Hospital has recently seen almost 500 staff off sick due to COVID. Þórólfur Guðnason, Iceland’s Chief Epidemiologist, notes that health care institutions must assess whether staff with little or no COVID-19 symptoms can resume working.
“There is no one talking about pulling sick people out of bed. We are talking more about people who have little or no symptoms,” comments Guðnason.
Guðnason further explains, “Each institution must evaluate it with its own people. There are two advantages to the situation; it is also very bad not to have employees care for sick people. It is this fine line that people need to traverse somehow.”
In further discussions on the topic, Guðlaug Rakel Guðjónsdóttir, Chief of Clinical Services at Landspítali, states, “Now those who have been vaccinated three times and have been without fever or asymptomatic for 24 hours can come to work. They will wear fine masks at work. We are not calling those to work who are in isolation.”
Discussions are underway on how to proceed. However, Guðjónsdóttir explains that they will see how things pan out over the next few days.