Information Minister Melford Nicholas has given the assurance to public officers awaiting exemptions under the government’s new vaccine mandate, that they will not be penalized.
Public servants who contracted COVID would be medically exempted as they cannot take the vaccine immediately.
Nicholas said on the radio on September 4, that these individuals will still be paid for the days they are out of office.
“The information that I have is that they will not be penalized for the period when they are under consideration. It is only at the end of the consideration period if they are not granted the consideration then penalty will apply but between the consideration and the penalty when it is upheld, they will be allowed to return to work with tests.”
Meanwhile, Nicholas says the government’s latest vaccine mandate is successful so far. His assumptions are based on the number of public servants who got vaccinated following the September 20 policy.
“If we are to judge by the increase that we have seen at the vaccination centres we would note that over the last two weeks, the number of persons who have come forward to be vaccinated has increased by approximately 7K persons.”
“That is a welcomed improvement in the number of persons coming forward to be vaccinated,” Melford Nicolas expressed.
