Civil Servants who wont take COVID-19 vaccine to face disciplinary action

All civil servants must now get a COVID-19 vaccine or face disciplinary action.

According to a statement from the Head of Public Service Joseph Kinyua, civil servants will now be required to get their vaccinations by the August 23 deadline.

Those who do not receive the vaccine by the specified date will be classified as discipline cases and will face disciplinary action.

Kinyua urged principal secretaries and accounting officers to ensure that the decision was fully implemented, notwithstanding reports that COVID-19 vaccination uptake has been poor, particularly among civil servants in security and education and other core services.

“In a recent NSAC meeting, it was reported that there was a low uptake of Covid-19 vaccines among public servants especially the security sector, teachers and the core civil service,” the statement reads.  

The Head of Public Service contended that poor vaccine uptake has impacted public service delivery.

Some employees, according to the statement, have purposefully evaded getting vaccinated in order to avoid going to work under the excuse of working from home.

“It was also observed that some public servants have deliberately avoided getting vaccinated so that they can stay away from work under the guise of working from home,” the statement adds. 

Meanwhile, a total of 1,804,375 vaccines have so far been administered across the country. Of these, total first doses are 1,105,470 while second doses are 698,905.

The uptake of the second dose among those who received their first dose is at 63.2% with the majority being males at 55% while females are at 45%. Proportion of adults fully vaccinated is 2.6%.

The uptake of the second dose by Priority Groups is as follows: Aged 58 years and above 214,722; Others 205,802; Health Workers 120,155; Teachers 102,007; while Security Officers are at 56,219.