COVID: Pregnant, Asthmatic and Unvaccinated - Flexible working

[Alice1988]

Hi all,

As the title suggests, i'm pregnant, asthmatic (on strong daily steroid inhalers) and unvaccinated during Covid. I've worked successfully from home over the past year (as reflected in PMRs and by manager) but am now being mandated (as are all staff) to go back to work as of 1st April. I'm in a shared office, so asked if I could do one day in the office, and two at home, to lower the statistics of my catching covid, rather than eliminate them. I have asked for this as a finite request - during the final 6 months of my pregnancy - and have a feeling that this is going to be rejected, and have no idea what to do next. I think i'll lose my job if i refuse to go back into the office, so can't do that. I know govt guidelines place me in the clinically vulnerable group, and advice given on govt.uk is that if you have an underlying health condition such as asthma, and you are any gestation - you should be very careful.

Any advice on what to do if i'm rejected would be so appreciated - thanks.

[ULA]

As you say since you are both pregnant and have an underlying health condition then although you are at no more risk of contracting the virus than any other non-pregnant person who is in similar health, you have an increased risk of becoming severely ill and of pre-term birth if you contract COVID-19.

Your employer should anyway, as you are pregnant carry out a risk assessment on your workplace, which may include advice from Occupational Health or Health and Saftey if such services are available in the company. This also needs to ensure that is takes account of any active national guidance on social distancing and/or advice for pregnant women considered to be clinically extremely vulnerable in place at the time and relevant to your work environment.

The result of this may be that the comapny needs to consider extending flexibly from home for you since you have proven that this has already not affected your work performance for the last year. Even if they feel that you cannot continue on your current capacity working at hpme they need to consider deploying you to another role that can be carried out from home.

Where adjustments to the work environment and role are not possible and alternative work cannot be found, you should be suspended on paid leave.