No anti-Covid jab, no salaries, declares Thane Municipal Corporation

The civic body also announced that those who aren’t fully vaccinated against Covid-19 will no longer be allowed to accompany or admit patients at Chatrapati Shivaji Hospital in Thane’s Kalwa

The Thane Municipal Corporation has declared that salaries of all its employees and frontline workers who haven’t been vaccinated at all against Covid-19 will soon be put on hold until they get jabbed.

A person gets vaccinated against Covid-19 in Tembhi Naka, Thane, Maharashtra. The Thane Municipal Corporation has declared salaries of its employees who haven’t been vaccinated at all against Covid-19 will soon be put on hold until they get jabbed. (HT photo)

The civic body also announced that those who aren’t fully vaccinated against Covid-19 will no longer be allowed to accompany or admit patients at Chatrapati Shivaji Hospital in Thane’s Kalwa.

The municipal corporation has given a week’s time to the unvaccinated to get jabbed against the coronavirus disease before the directives are imposed.

The orders were issued at a press conference held by Thane’s mayor Naresh Mhaske and civic commissioner Vipin Sharma.

The civic body argued that its aim is to urgently get its staff vaccinated because they directly deal with the public.

Mhaske said, “The salaries of the employees who have not taken a single dose of the Covid-19 vaccine or have not taken the second dose or are way past the deadline [for a second dose] will be put on hold. Civic officials and employees will have to submit their vaccination certificates to disclose the status of vaccination. Apart from this, relatives or friends who accompany patients to Kalwa hospital also have to be fully vaccinated. Those who will not be vaccinated will immediately have to get vaccinated and [only] then can they accompany patients.”

The hospital sees hundreds of patients visiting or being admitted every day from various cities of Maharashtra, especially from rural parts of Thane district, making it a challenging task for the authorities to impose the new directives.

Civic officials said private doctors, too, have being asked to get fully vaccinated against Covid-19 and ensure that their employees were also fully jabbed.