While there's no vaccine for COVID-19, there is one for influenza. With the possibility of a new surge of COVID-19 in the fall and winter, health experts and officials are encouraging early flu shots to avoid what has been dubbed a "twindemic"—a severe flu season combined with a new wave of COVID-19.
Marc Lipsitch, an epidemiologist at Harvard University, says:
“The worst-case scenario is both [the coronavirus and the flu] are spreading fast and causing severe disease, complicating diagnoses and presenting a double burden on the health care system.”
Employers are also concerned with the complications of both viruses. As we enter the 2020-2021 flu season, it’s crucial that employers are prepared to mitigate both viruses for the health and safety of their employees in order to avoid the costs that result from absenteeism and lowered productivity due to illness.
Gift card incentives are one way for organizations to encourage employees not only to get the flu vaccination this season, but to practice healthy behavior like hand washing, taking screen breaks, and eating healthy.
Beyond Flu Clinics
The easiest way to manage the flu season as an employer is to encourage employees to get vaccinated. As the CDC suggests, and was often the case in many office environments, prevention was primarily done through an in-office flu clinic. Bringing the vaccines to employees made it easier to administer the vaccine in a timely manner and was likely to ensure that a greater percentage of employees were vaccinated before the height of flu season.
Today, many companies continue to have employees working remotely, which makes the annual in-office flu shot clinic not possible. Remote employees run the same risk of absenteeism and decreased productivity if they become infected with the flu, so encourage both a remote and in-office workforce to get vaccinated and adopt healthier behaviors with an easy to administer incentive, like a gift card.
Gift Cards That Incentivize and Promote Employee Wellness
Gift cards are a great way to get your employees started with wellness, and to promote specific initiatives, like flu prevention. eGift cards are a convenient, contactless way for employers to deliver and incentivize employees to get vaccinated in a timely manner.
Creating a culture of wellness, whether it’s computer screen breaks throughout the day, fitness challenges employees can do at home or at a safe distance, or many other program options, wellness can directly contribute to employee health, productivity, and job satisfaction.
Flexible in both brand and denomination, eGift cards can fit any budget and delivery to remote employees all over the country can be done with the click of a button, directly to their email or via text.
GiftCard Partners’ Engage2Reward® Portal offers a variety of gift card brands in both physical and eGift cards allowing you to tailor your incentives to your individual employee wellness programs and goals. With Engage2Reward, you can:
- Support wellness with a CVS Select Card®, limiting employees to purchase only healthy items in a CVS Pharmacy®, including the flu shot.
- Offer employee meals for remote and essential workers with a meal kit service like Home Chef or a delivery service like DoorDash.
- Decrease employee stress by giving employees at-home streaming options to binge-worthy services like Hulu and Showtime with gift cards.
Register for your free Engage2Reward account today and access over 250 digital brands to find the best wellness incentives for your employees as you gear up for flu season.
