Health Minister Yvette D’Ath confirms staff have quit over vaccine mandate as exemptions denied

Almost three quarters of all mandatory vaccination exemption requests processed by Queensland Health have been denied, with Yvette D’Ath confirming “quite a few people” have quit over the mandate.

More than 1200 health staff’s mandatory vaccination exemption requests are still being processed but it’s not known how many of them are being paid to do nothing.

The figure prompted Health Minister Yvette D’Ath to last week instruct her department to finalise the requests by January 28 as already-stretched hospitals grapple with the escalating wave of Omicron.

As of January 17, there were 2590 exemption requests lodged by Queensland Health staff across the state with 354 of those having now been approved.

A further 987 were declined.

But Queensland Health is still processing 1249 requests with these employees either having to take leave they are entitled to such as long service or annual, work remotely or move into an alternative temporary role where the vaccine is not mandated.

Health Minister Yvette D'Ath says some Queensland Health staff have quit over the vaccine mandate. Picture: NCA NewsWire / Dan Peled

But there could also be unvaccinated staff who are still being paid who aren’t required to use their leave accruals.

This figures could not be provided.

The Courier-Mail earlier this week revealed some ambulance and police staff whose exemptions were still being processed weren’t required to use their leave while off from work.

Ms D’Ath said to remain working, public health workers simply needed to get vaccinated – like the vast majority of Queensland Health employees and every day Queenslanders who already were.

She said “quite a few people” had either quit following the mandate or then left after being issued a show cause notice.

“So there’s quite a large number who have already moved on,” she said.

“There’s a number that are still going through an exemption process so as people understand, procedural fairness, they will not be (issued a) show cause as to why they shouldn’t be terminated while they’ve still got an exemption request in place.

“However, I’ve asked all chief executives of every hospital and health service to have all of those exemption applications determined by the end of next week and where someone is not granted an exemption, they will be issued a show cause as to why their employment shouldn’t be terminated if they remain unvaccinated.”

Health staff were given until mid-December last year to be fully vaccinated.

Among requests still pending are 154 at the Cairns and Hinterland HHS, 118 at Gold Coast HHS, 147 at Metro North and 290 at Metro South.