What measures can licensees put in place to lower the risk of transmission from volunteers to patients?

Despite the exemption of measles and diphtheria immunity requirement for general volunteers, licensees should continue to put in place prevailing infection prevention and control measures to prevent the spread of such contagious diseases.

In addition, licensees are encouraged to assess their own situation and take other risk-based measures, such as crowd management and cutting down non-essential interactions for highly immune compromised groups of patients. Licensees have the flexibility to tighten the measures as and when required, based on their own circumstances. For example, if there is an outbreak in the facility, the healthcare institution can impose stricter infection control measures, or stop the volunteer activities all together, or require that their volunteers be updated with measles and diphtheria vaccinations accordingly.