As you may know, from 19th July, restrictions will start to lift across England. There is much concern among medical experts and doctors about this especially as rates of COVID infection continue to rise. The delta variant is still very much circulating in our community. We have noticed a large increase in cases in our practice.
Double-vaccination is important for reducing serious illness and transmission. However, we still have fully vaccinated patients testing positive and some of those have needed hospital care. We cannot rely on COVID vaccination alone.
We regularly see patients at the surgery who are sick or vulnerable – for example, receiving cancer treatment or taking medication that affects their immune system. We must continue to protect these patients who need to attend the practice for consultations, blood tests and treatment.
It is also essential that we protect our staff without whom we cannot continue to deliver our services to patients. We have had members of our team recently on sick leave, who have had to self-isolate themselves or care for young children who have had to self-isolate. This causes staffing difficulties when they have to be off work at short notice.
At Haddenham Medical Centre we will follow the NHS guidance to keep our patients and colleagues as safe as possible. We will continue to wear personal protective equipment including masks when seeing our patients.
Unless you have a valid medical exemption, you will need to wear face coverings when coming to the surgery. We will ask you to continue to wash your hands regularly and use hand gel. Please follow the social distancing rules within the practice.
Help us to help you, to keep our most vulnerable patients safe and protect our NHS services.
Dr Mark Howcutt
Haddenham Medical Centre
