What is the definition of a "Front Line Worker"?

Graces7

_Brian wrote: »

Sorry folks but outside the medical staff dealing with sick patients everyone else is a worker.

I saw on another site a beauty salon worker saying they were front line.


There’s a massive gulf between doing someone’s nails and working in a hospital dealing with sick and dying patients. Pretending anything else is just disgusting.

In full agreement. The poster who differentiated between "Frontline" and " essential" has it right.

Many others are simply doing their regular work as usual, Important but not facing the enemy full on as medical staff are.

mrslancaster

The people who keep the electric networks going 24/7. Imo they are the most essential as very little can run or work without electricity.

Zebra3

smck321 wrote: »

Society invests billions every year internationally to reduce road deaths, entire sectors of employment exist to prevent it. More over substantial R&D goes into reducing road deaths and the overall aim of some technologies is to eliminate it entirely.

Not doing a good job.

lan wrote: »

Quit your bull****.

Nobody bats an eyelid at road death figures.

Stating facts isn't bs.

lan

Zebra3 wrote: »

Nobody bats an eyelid at road death figures.

Stating facts isn't bs.

You conveniently ignored where I pointed out that in Ireland there have been over 10x as many COVID deaths this year compared to road deaths last year.

The figures are not even remotely comparable.

smck321

Zebra3 wrote: »

Not doing a good job.

In the contrary road deaths in Ireland have decreased massively since the 60s and 70s even without considering the number of increased cars on the road.

suicide_circus

lan wrote: »

Ireland had 141 road deaths last year according to the RSA:

https://rsa.ie/en/RSA/Road-Safety/RSA-Statistics/Deaths-injuries-on-Irish-roads/

We've had 1,838 COVID deaths according to Google so far this year

The difference being that anyone who dies of a heart attack while sitting in or next to a vehicle is not recorded as a road death.

Someone who dies of a heart attack and subsequently test positive for covid 19 is recorded as a covid 19 death.

We have absolutely no idea how many people have died with covid 19 as the only or even primary cause of death.

smck321

suicide_circus wrote: »

The difference being that anyone who dies of a heart attack while sitting in or next to a vehicle is not recorded as a road death.

Someone who dies of a heart attack and subsequently test positive for covid 19 is recorded as a covid 19 death.

We have absolutely no idea how many people have died with covid 19 as the only or even primary cause of death.

Those deaths will then be further triaged into 3 categories, likely, probably and possible. And likely are the biggest group. Just because there's a few outliers that might have died of something else doesn't invalidate covid deaths as a whole.

Also regarding your specific example of a covid + heart attack, covid causes a hypercoaguable state so that heart attack could very well have been caused by covid due to increased clotting.

Strumms

Paulzx wrote: »

Yeah. History will never remember the Covid 19 pandemic

Only 39 million cases and 1 million deaths so far......

Yep.. This won’t ever be forgotten. This is almost WW III scale stuff.

Exempt the enemy isnt an army in a traditional sense... you can’t nuke it, shoot it, bomb the fûck out of it. Only thing you can do is avoid people and wait for a vaccine.

321123

The consultant on 200K+ a year that didn't do a jack **** during the whole first wave lockdown due to having his/her department shut down and all appointments cancelled, but still receiving free meals paid for by the 30K a year workers through different charities is apparently a Front Line worker.

So is of course the underpaid ICU nurse working double shifts and the being of collapse in some underfunded Irish hospital.

An Ri rua

321123 wrote: »

and the being of collapse in some underfunded Irish hospital.

Are you referring to Shiva?

Dressoutlet

If you work in the local spar, Tesco, McDonalds or KFC you're not a front line worker. Essential worker I'd say for Spar and Tesco and the like.
Front line workers are nurses and Dr's in hospitals in a and e and ICU. Also the Ambulance, fire brigade and Gardai.
Not the consultant of a hospital, or a member of AGS who hasn't been on the streets.
Also home help are not front line workers. Absolutely essential though and greatly appreciated

Higgins5473

Higgins5473 wrote: »

Clearly all those working in hospitals, clinics, surgery's dealing with those that are ill or presenting with symptoms are "front line workers" have, and always will be.

But, what is a front line worker outside of this now? Is it still retail staff which have massive amounts of protective equipment between them and consumer?

What is a front line worker at this stage? A barber and a teacher are as much "front line working" at this stage if we are to stay open and listen to and believe the level of danger that we are being warned about.

Anyone in the chain of keeping you able to get the things you need.

MelbourneMan

If I can interject here, the concept of a front line worker was a clever but cynical fabrication of a few trades unions about 10 years ago, as public sector pay was being cut. It was an effort by unions with members who were familiar to the general public to exploit familiarity and garner sympathy for reduced cuts at the expense of cloudy behind the scenes jobs people who should be cut instead or be cut more. Sort of : how cut you dream of cutting the pay of the nice nurse who looked after you so well (and indeed she probably did) in A&E when you needed her ? It should be cut from these pencil pushing ninnies behind desks that you never meet, and you dont even know why they are there, and they probably dont do anything useful anyway. Liam Doran was one of the main exponents of this creation I think. Some people swallowed the narrative. It was a very devious and opportunist tactic.

khalessi

MelbourneMan wrote: »

If I can interject here, the concept of a front line worker was a clever but cynical fabrication of a few trades unions about 10 years ago, as public sector pay was being cut. It was an effort by unions with members who were familiar to the general public to exploit familiarity and garner sympathy for reduced cuts at the expense of cloudy behind the scenes jobs people who should be cut instead or be cut more. Sort of : how cut you dream of cutting the pay of the nice nurse who looked after you so well (and indeed she probably did) in A&E when you needed her ? It should be cut from these pencil pushing ninnies behind desks that you never meet, and you dont even know why they are there, and they probably dont do anything useful anyway. Liam Doran was one of the main exponents of this creation I think. Some people swallowed the narrative. It was a very devious and opportunist tactic.

I respectfully disagree. The idea of frontline has been there for at least 30 years but we tend to celebrate/recognise it more in last few years. Firefighters, gardaí, nurses doctors and army were always considered frontline.

It was always referred to as the emergency services which has expanded over the years to include coastguard, mountain rescue and civil defence depending on the emergency.

Maybe having grown up as the child of a fire fighter I was always just used to the term of emergency services and being on the coalface.

Higgins5473

khalessi wrote: »

Having been a frontline worker, I would think the following are frontline, gardaí, HCW, soldiers, civil defence, mountain rescue, navy, coast guard, ya know, the people you call in an emergency.

Essential services are the ones that back up the above, and keep the country going, so shops, lab workers, scientists, radiographers, courts, judges, truck drivers, ya know like the people who maintain food supples and help maintain law and order.

After this, electrical workers, carpenters, plumbers, teachers maybe.


I think of it like this, in the event of an apocalypse who am I yelling for, and the first port of call is not the philiosophy lecturer or the history teacher, sorry guys.

It is the people who can save people and maintain law order, food supples and maintain or reintroduce stabiility.

Teaching is not an essential service, people are not screaming for teachers in a famine, earthquake, landslide, etc. They are screaming for the services that can help save people, make them safe, maintain law and order, provide shelter and food, electricity, and clean water. After all of this when everything is stable, education comes into play.

When I arrive at the scene of an accident, no one wants to hear, stand back I am a primary/secondary school teacher, or I am a librarian I read about this in a book, grand if that is all there is. They want to hear stand back I am a nurse/doctor/ paramedic.

khalessi wrote: »

I respectfully disagree. The idea of frontline has been there for at least 30 years but we tend to celebrate/recognise it more in last few years. Firefighters, gardaí, nurses doctors and army were always considered frontline.

It was always referred to as the emergency services which has expanded over the years to include coastguard, mountain rescue and civil defence depending on the emergency.

Maybe having grown up as the child of a fire fighter I was always just used to the term of emergency services and being on the coalface.

It’s not about what people are screaming for, it’s about those that are at risk.

My wife is a nurse, I don’t post on this regularly but have mentioned this throughout this crisis. She’s working in the Beacon Private, she spent most of the lockdown twiddling her thumbs, the hospital did not have one single Covid admission. She got paid very well and tells me herself she and many of her colleagues are embarrassed to be considered some kind of front line worker.

I lost my business and laid off 4 staff and returned to working as a teacher. Teachers receive nothing but abuse and accusations of laziness since the outset of this. There seems to be a very clear correlation between between schools reopening and Covid cases rising, the department of education has done little to nothing in terms of protecting teachers and auxiliary staff in schools which are very concentrated and often poorly ventilated working environments.

So, as an example, your firefighter parent potentially could’ve done sweet damn all their entire career, been lazy or just a coward. But they are a front line worker just because of the uniform?

Teaching is an essential service by the way, potentially the most essential and very most basic service which has existed long before all those you have considered essential.

khalessi

Higgins5473 wrote: »

It’s not about what people are screaming for, it’s about those that are at risk.

My wife is a nurse, I don’t post on this regularly but have mentioned this throughout this crisis. She’s working in the Beacon Private, she spent most of the lockdown twiddling her thumbs, the hospital did not have one single Covid admission. She got paid very well and tells me herself she and many of her colleagues are embarrassed to be considered some kind of front line worker.

I lost my business and laid off 4 staff and returned to working as a teacher. Teachers receive nothing but abuse and accusations of laziness since the outset of this. There seems to be a very clear correlation between between schools reopening and Covid cases rising, the department of education has done little to nothing in terms of protecting teachers and auxiliary staff in schools which are very concentrated and often poorly ventilated working environments.

So, as an example, your firefighter parent potentially could’ve done sweet damn all their entire career, been lazy or just a coward. But they are a front line worker just because of the uniform?

Teaching is an essential service by the way, potentially the most essential and very most basic service which has existed long before all those you have considered essential.

Well I am a teacher and also a nurse. My dad wasnt lazy or a coward. The uniform doesnt make them frontline workers otherwise any uniform would be, it is the nature of the job. It amazes me how people just assume things cause they know a person who did a thing.

Your wife and colleagues could have offered to take leave and work in frontline but chose not to.
In emergencies it is who people ask for. A pandemic is an emergency and teaching is not frontline, no matter how you paint it. It suits the department to paint it as frontline to open schools, but they do not provide equal guidelines for teaching as they do for other frontline services. A good example of this is covid testing. My sister came in contact with covid+ve doctor, both wearing masks and as she put it at least 2 metres away. She was tested 3 times in 7 days, all negative tg. Me, wearing a mask 1 hour two days running covid positive kid, me wearing a mask not considered close contact despite less than 90cm away from him. Typical treatment of teachers.

Higgins5473

khalessi wrote: »

Well I am a teacher and also a nurse. My dad wasnt lazy or a coward. The uniform doesnt make them frontline workers otherwise any uniform would be, it is the nature of the job. It amazes me how people just assume things cause they know a person who did a thing.

Your wife and colleagues could have offered to take leave and work in frontline but chose not to.
In emergencies it is who people ask for. A pandemic is an emergency and teaching is not frontline, no matter how you paint it. It suits the department to paint it as frontline to open schools, but they do not provide equal guidelines for teaching as they do for other frontline services.

khalessi wrote: »

I tought we were already on 4.1 or something

Christ, what do you teach? Usually it’s the confusion between taught and thought. What’s ‘tought’

khalessi

Higgins5473 wrote: »

Christ, what do you teach? Usually it’s the confusion between taught and thought. What’s ‘tought’

Well first of all manners, which you seem to be seriously lacking, your retort on spelling says a lot about your character and the fact you have a weak argument. And it is a typing error.

seanod99

bigar wrote: »

I would define this very narrow: anyone that needs to deal with the ill and without whom it would not function. Only medical workforce in other words.

That does not mean there are no other important functions, like supermarket employees to name one, but if push come to shove these functions can be done without.

So you are saying if push comes to shove we can do without food but not medical care?

Emergency room visits would probably balloon with the aftermath of starvation.

We can do without medical care, not food or water, which are kid will tell you are the two basic necessities to life.

_Brian

mrslancaster wrote: »

The people who keep the electric networks going 24/7. Imo they are the most essential as very little can run or work without electricity.

Essential, but not front line.


ESB crews up a pole keeping us all supplied are indeed doing essential work. But are not "front line" workers like medical staff having to work on Covid wards regularly.. These are the true front line workers..

Outlaw Pete

_Brian wrote: »

Sorry folks but outside the medical staff dealing with sick patients everyone else is a worker.

I saw on another site a beauty salon worker saying they were front line.

There’s a massive gulf between doing someone’s nails and working in a hospital dealing with sick and dying patients. Pretending anything else is just disgusting.

Agreed, had someone refer to me as a frontline worker today and had to correct them. A resident in the residential care facility I work at (as a driver) was diagnosed with Covid alright, but in my mind unless you're actually medical staff dealing with Covid patients, then I fail to see how, or why, anyone should think of them as frontline. Even hands-on staff here don't see themselves as such and so tbf I think it's others claiming certain types of workers are frontline more than it is those particular workers themselves saying it.

Graces7

Outlaw Pete wrote: »

Agreed, had someone refer to me as a frontline worker today and had to correct them. A resident in the residential care facility I work at (as a driver) was diagnosed with Covid alright, but in my mind unless you're actually medical staff dealing with Covid patients, then I fail to see how, or why, anyone should think of them as frontline. Even hands-on staff here don't see themselves as such and so tbf I think it's others claiming certain types of workers are frontline more than it is those particular workers themselves saying it.

And in this case where a dangerous virus is involved there is also very much an element of personal risk involved in being a true frontline worker in an epidemic.

Especially given the very high level of covdi-19 among health care workers. contracted whole on that front line of the battle e against it Some have died.

speckle

I think frontline is a movable term depending on the crisis eg fire fighters with the massive forest fires this year or those who put out reactor fires like Fukashima or Chernoybl or UN soldiers trying to peacekeep.

What about civilians who work with aid agencys, like during famines, earthquakes, ebola or covid in third world countries for example handling the bodies of the ill, the dying or dead knowing the risk.

What about high risk people who helped others during spring who where even higher risk?

What about the respiratory specialist in a private hospital who didnt sign on to help in the public hospital system and then charged the public when called in to consult on difficult cases versus those consultants who did sign up or just volunteered for free?

When I think of the emergency medical services this year....some twiddled their thumbs, some broke restrictions, some did their jobs, some went above and beyond/ think Italy and some were heros and heroines like the optamalagist and his peers who blew the whistle on covid and continued to work even with a lack of proper safety gear.

Dr. Li Wenliang who left behind a pregnant wife and child. May you rest in peace.

https://fee.org/articles/the-coronavirus-whistleblower-who-gave-his-life/

There are humble frontline workers hidden in plain view at all times... there is also, a hero or heroine in everyone of us just waiting for the right time to shine a light of hope . I thank all who shone their lights bright this year in whatever occupation.