Flu jab to be covered for primary school staff from 2027
Employers in primary education must offer and pay for the vaccination from August 2027.
Staff in primary education will be able to receive a flu jab at their employer’s expense from 1 August 2027. The agreement has been laid down by the parties to the collective labour agreement and does not apply to people whose vaccination is already covered by the national programme or their health insurance.
The agreement applies to all staff in primary education who wish to take up the offer. This therefore includes not only teachers, but all staff covered by the collective labour agreement for primary education.
Employers will have room to organise the scheme themselves. A school board could, for example, bring in a vaccination service at the school or have staff arrange the jab themselves and claim back the costs. According to CNV, the collective agreement does not prescribe a uniform method of implementation.
The obligation to make the offer and reimburse the costs begins on 1 August 2027. For the current school year, employers are free to offer a scheme already. According to CNV, there is too little preparation time before the coming flu season to organise this everywhere as an immediate requirement.
The scheme is not intended to oblige people to have the jab. Rijksoverheid says that an employer may not require someone to receive a flu vaccination. The new right concerns the offer and reimbursement, not participation.
Staff who are already covered by the national flu vaccination programme or whose costs are already reimbursed through their health insurance are excluded from the collective-agreement scheme. This prevents the same vaccination from being reimbursed twice.
The agreement is part of the employment conditions for primary education and is not a new national vaccination requirement. The financial and organisational consequences lie with school boards, which must decide for themselves how to implement the scheme.
It is not yet known how many staff will ultimately take up the offer. Nor has it yet been decided whether all school boards will use the same provider or the same period for the vaccination.
One story, several perspectives
What is established
- The parties to the collective agreement have agreed that employers in primary education will offer and pay for a flu jab from 1 August 2027.
- The vaccination itself remains voluntary.
- School boards may organise the implementation themselves.
Left
Arguments An employer whose staff work every day in busy classrooms also bears responsibility for public health and the continuity of education. A free offer lowers the threshold and prevents income from determining who gets vaccinated.
Values Solidarity, prevention and protection of vulnerable pupils and colleagues.
Consequences For school boards, this means additional organisation and costs, but potentially also less sickness absence and less disruption to lessons.
Centre
Arguments A free offer combines freedom of choice with a practical form of prevention. School boards are given room to adapt the scheme to their size and local implementation.
Values Proportionality, voluntariness and feasibility.
Consequences The effect will depend on the quality of the information provided and on whether schools make the scheme easy to access.
Right
Arguments Vaccination remains first and foremost a personal choice. Employers should not quietly turn into implementers of public-health policy and should be able to assess whether the costs outweigh the expected effect.
Values Individual responsibility, freedom of choice and prudent use of public funds.
Consequences A voluntary offer limits coercion, but may also have little effect if participation remains low while school boards still incur implementation costs.
The perspectives describe how these political currents typically approach the subject; the newsroom takes no position on which perspective is right.
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The scheme, exceptions and start date are based on CNV’s collective-agreement information. The voluntary nature of vaccination was checked separately with Rijksoverheid.
- confirmed Employers in primary education must offer and pay for a flu jab from 1 August 2027. — Mentioned in CNV’s explanation of the collective agreement. source
- confirmed The scheme applies to all staff in primary education who wish to use the vaccination. — CNV describes the agreement as applying to all staff in primary education. source
- confirmed Employers may decide for themselves how to organise the offer. — Explicitly stated by CNV. source
- confirmed An employer may not require someone to have a flu jab. — Rijksoverheid.nl gives this as a general rule. source
- confirmed The scheme excludes people whose vaccination is already covered by the national programme or their health insurance. — Mentioned in CNV’s explanation of the collective agreement. source
Editor's note
The collective-agreement provision and start date have been confirmed by CNV. Staff take-up, implementation costs for each school board and the precise national participation rate remain unknown.Sources
More on this in Dutch media
- AD — „basisonderwijs griepprik”
- de Volkskrant — „basisonderwijs griepprik”
- RTL Nieuws — „basisonderwijs griepprik”