As flu season is under way, hospitals and health care facilities should consider mandating that all of their employees receive influenza vaccinations, maintains the National Business Group on Health, a nonprofit organization that is focused on representing large employers' perspective on national health policy issues. By receiving annual flu vaccinations, employees in these health care facilities are less likely to infect other employees and their families but also patients, who are already more susceptible to the flu because of their sicknesses.  

The Centers for Disease Control and Prevention reports that only 63.5 percent of employees at health care facilities received the flu vaccination during the 2010-11 flu season, which Helen Darling, president and CEO of NBGH, believes just isn't enough. There also are other studies that show one in four health care workers shows evidence of having the flu annually, and 70 percent of health care personnel still work while experiencing flu-like symptoms.  

"Transmission of seasonal influenza between health care workers and patients is a significant patient and worker safety issue," Darling says. "Failure to prevent the transmission of seasonal flu between health care workers and patients also increases health costs."