Q. In the event that I would be infected during a hospitalization or a consultation with an unvaccinated health professional, would it be possible to sue this person or the environment where he works, especially if serious consequences ensue?
Marcelle Binette
R. Remember that the government has given up forcing employees of the health network to be vaccinated. There are therefore a few thousand left in the network who are in direct contact with patients.
Your question is therefore very relevant.
However, it is important to make it clear from the outset that the issue of eliminating the requirement for compulsory vaccination is a game-changer.
“With the standards currently in force, an establishment cannot be considered to be at fault for the simple fact that it has let an unvaccinated person work”, explains Patrick Martin-Ménard, lawyer specializing in health law.
On the other hand, establishments still have the obligation to put in place measures to ensure the safety of users.
Effective infection prevention and control measures, for example.
Including a protocol for screening employees with COVID-19.
Quebec specified that health workers who are not vaccinated will have to continue to undergo three screening tests per week to limit the risk of infection linked to their refusal.
So what would happen if a patient contracted COVID-19 from contact with an unvaccinated and infected healthcare professional?
“You have to prove that the establishment has committed a fault, a violation of the rules of the art, underlines Patrick Martin-Ménard. And it is also necessary to prove that it is this fault that caused the damage that the person suffered. ”
And that would not be an easy task, warns the director of health law and policy programs at the University of Sherbrooke, Mélanie Bourassa Forcier.
“The most difficult in a case like that is to prove causality,” adds the professor. It can be very difficult to show that the person has not caught COVID-19 elsewhere. ”