80% Of Singapore Firms Have Vaccinated Entire Staff
SINGAPORE – The Ministry of Health (MOH) announced that as of 19 December, 80 percent of companies here have employees who have all been inoculated against COVID-19, reported ChannelNewsAsia (CNA) on Monday afternoon (27 December, SGT).
At the same time, 98 percent of the overall workforce in Singapore have been vaccinated, although these statistics exclude individuals who are self-employed. As a result, approximately 52,000 staff here remain unvaccinated.
Of this figure, roughly 6,700 persons are age 60 years and above. And these people are at high risk of severe illness or death from COVID-19 infection, noted the government agency.
“Only a small proportion of these employees are medically ineligible for vaccination,” stated MOH in its latest advisory on COVID-19 vaccination at the workplace.
The advisory comes after the Ministry of Health just announced only vaccinated workers will be allowed to return to their office effective 15 January 2022.
As for unvaccinated staff, companies may redeploy them to roles that can be done from home. They can also be placed on no-pay leave “based on mutually agreeable terms”. If both are not possible, they can be terminated with notice as a last resort in accordance with their employment agreement.
“If termination of employment is due to employees’ inability to be at the workplace to perform their contracted work, such termination of employment would not be considered as wrongful dismissal,” explained the Ministry of Manpower (MOM).
As for staff who are certified to be medically ineligible to be vaccinated under Singapore’s National Vaccination Programme, MOM advised that they can be allowed to return to their office. However, employers should consider permitting them to work from home (WFH) if they are able to do so.
“Employers should not terminate the employment of medically eligible but unvaccinated pregnant employees and are strongly encouraged to give special consideration to their needs and concerns,” added the Ministry.
