Federal Manager's Daily Report

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As its workload increased due to the pandemic, the VA was able to increase its staff by a net of about 5 percent in 2020, the department has reported, with nearly 46,000 new external hires partly offset by losses of about 32,000 employees due to attrition for a year-end total of just above 367,000.

The VA has long been understaffed in many medical occupations but was able to add about a net 4,000 nurses, bringing the year-end total to nearly 78,000, and more than 2,100 net employees in medical support assistance, bringing the total to nearly 30,000. The agency also reported gains in various other medical occupations, as well as in custodial workers and other occupations.

A report on pandemic response actions at the VA also shows that in its medical branch, the Veterans Health Administration, there were two main spikes of COVID-19-related sick leave—to 1 percent in mid-July and 1.6 percent in early December.

However, it added, use of other types of leave such as annual leave was down through the year in general as well as around holidays such as the Labor Day, Thanksgiving Day and Christmas Day holidays.

The VA is among the relatively few agencies that regularly report on COVID-19 statistics in their workforces, most recently showing a cumulative total of nearly 19,000 infections, of which some 160 are current, and 140 deaths. Nearly 290,000 VA employees currently are fully vaccinated and the department further has fully vaccinated some 27,000 employees of other federal agencies along with some 2.4 million veterans.

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2022 Federal Employees Handbook