THE NHS wants all front-line healthcare workers to have a flu jab this winter, warning trusts that staff refusing the vaccine could be banned from treating patients.

Last winter more than a third of front-line NHS workers at the Robert Jones and Agnes Hunt Orthopaedic Hospital Trust were not vaccinated - during the worst flu season in a decade.

Public Health England figures reveal that 422 front-line healthcare workers at the Robert Jones and Agnes Hunt Orthopaedic Hospital Trust did not get the flu vaccine between September 2017 and February 2018.

Of the 1,141 doctors, nurses, clinical staff and support workers at the trust with direct patient contact, 719 did get the vaccine - an uptake rate of 63 per cent.

That's lower than the England average of 69 per cent, and far behind targets.

In a letter to trusts earlier this month, the NHS praised trusts which surpassed 90 per cent coverage last year.

However, vaccine uptake varied considerably between trusts. Wye Valley Trust in Herefordshire and East Lancashire Hospital Trust reported the highest rates, with 92 per cent of front-line workers vaccinated.

At the Essex Partnership University Trust, the uptake was just 39 per cent.

The NHS said making vaccination "near universal" is to protect patients in higher-risk clinical environments, like neonatal intensive care and cancer wards, and limit their exposure to unvaccinated staff.

Up to 50 per cent of people with the flu may not even know they have it - but for patients with weakened immune systems or respiratory problems, the flu can be life-threatening.

The NHS said that trusts should "take appropriate steps to maintain the safety of the service", including transferring unvaccinated workers away from high-risk patients.

It outlined several reasons why healthcare workers with direct patient contact should be vaccinated, including recent NICE guidelines outlining a link between lower rates of staff vaccination and increased patient death.

It also said that flu-related staff sickness puts pressure on other staff members.

Public service trade union Unison, which represents healthcare workers, said that the NHS should encourage staff to get the flu jab, but not make it compulsory.

Unison head of health Sara Gorton said: "We need to understand why vaccination rates vary so much between different health organisations.

"Some struggle to get teams who are trained to administer the jab to staff working in remote or varied locations."

She added: "Healthcare staff may choose not to get the jab for fear of allergic reactions, or a phobia around needles."

Chief nurse for NHS England Professor Jane Cummings said that "myths" persist around the flu vaccine, with the "big one" being that it gives people the flu.

She said: "By getting vaccinated against flu, healthcare workers can protect themselves, their families, colleagues and patients, making sure we have a healthy workforce and helping to reduce the pressure on services over winter."

Public Health England said that it encourages action from professional health bodies to increase vaccine uptake.

PHE medical director, Professor Paul Cosford, said: "There is a dual responsibility on trusts and healthcare workers to get rates as high as possible."

Bev Tabernacle, director of nursing and deputy chief executive at the RJAH Orthopaedic Hospital, said: “The Trust places great emphasis on flu vaccinations, we have shown this through our increase in uptake from our staff last year from 43 per cent to 64 per cent.

“We are continuing to stress the need for our staff to have the vaccination to protect themselves, their patients and their families and we will improve our flu uptake rates even further this year.

“We’ve also looked at what our colleagues are doing differently at other trusts, and have used that learning to shape how we’re going to do some things differently this year.

“This year, we’re launching our strongest campaign yet, which will include a powerful story of one of our own nurses, who fell seriously ill earlier this year. Thankfully she had her flu vaccine but was warned her outcome might have been gravely different had she not been vaccinated. That’s an extremely hard-hitting message to share with our staff.

“We have also trained more staff flu immunisers this year and have lots of incentives for our staff available to encourage uptake.”