Mask Mandate

[smitty75]

And on a side note, I saw some references to osha and epa in an earlier post. While epa primarily cares about the bugs and bunnies (not employees), osha fines have now topped $2.8 million dollars. This is primarily related to respiratory protection, incident reporting, and general duty. I deal with this daily, so if any fellow Supra or moomba owners need support give me a shout. Always happy to help out.


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[sandm]

smitty,
amazed at how osha is now investigating covid cases at work and IF it's proven you contracted rona at work it's osha recordable. this is just plain silly.......
it's like blaming your employer for catching a cold at work.

part of the deeper seed of our litigious society that we live in. someone is wronged in a way they don't like and first thought is who to sue.... spend 30 minutes driving on our main roads in vegas and count the number of billboards for ambulance chasers. it's quite sick.... and saw an ad for a lawyer on late night tv a few weeks ago and the scrolling caption on the bottom stated "now taking covid work cases"....

[2in2out]

smitty,
amazed at how osha is now investigating covid cases at work and IF it's proven you contracted rona at work it's osha recordable. this is just plain silly.......
it's like blaming your employer for catching a cold at work.

A cold is a communicable disease, requiring that if it was acquired during the course of work, it should be a covered and compensable exposure. Because treatment rarely requires other than self care, an exam by a medical provider and prescribed amount of days off, along with follow-up visit to release the employee back to work.

We have normalized the “cold” which is a corona virus of different origin and multiple variations, because of multiple factors. Employees feel pressured to come to work because they aren’t provided adequate leave amounts from work, or they can’t afford lost hours, employer threatening termination, etc. But the economic costs of the cold are fairly significant causing lost time, production, and increasing incidence of other occupational injury. Many decongestants cause dizziness or drowsy feeling, which lead to potential for injury or accident from those operating equipment or machinery.

Employers shun their responsibility to protect workers from infection, and employees are pressed to come to work sick. Customer interactions introduce every variant of cold virus, but employers shun, ignore, or are plain ignorant to what their responsibilities are. It’s a complex problem, and COVID has forced the need to address it. If it morphs into something with less lethality and mortality, it will be normalized to the flu or typical cold. Vaccinations will accelerate this normalization.

Being an employer sucks when you learn and understand your responsibilities under “community right to know” law. Employees and customers also have a responsibility, but to a lesser degree. The largest problem with this is the determination of where and who you acquired the communicable disease. With thing like TB, MRSA, and HIV these are fairly easy to chase down in the healthcare setting. They occur in well defined populations and locations. Contract tracing is easy in this regard.

With the cold, flu, or COVID, it’s much more nebulous, because of the aeresolization and ability to attach to fomites for transport. If the source is a coworker or customer, this is covetable under workers comp, unless the employee did not utilize appropriate and provided protections. Caveat is, during shortages of protections, the protection standard can only apply to the highest available standard. Currently, a single use level B suit and PAPR are the highest standard recommended, but which are in limited supply. For the general public simple face masks are the highest available standard.

Without frequent testing, we can’t define who is a transmission risk, and keep them from the workplace. Lag times in test results also create a problem for industry and identification of where contact is, and who is liable. The government has provided funding for employers to provide leave for employees when they acquire via occupational routes.

Employers and employees have a responsibility to understand their rights and responsibilities with regard to hazards in the workplace. Occupational protection is meeting significant practical challenges, and the legal challenges will be forthcoming. Vulnerabilities in contact tracing and privacy are already raising their dirty heads.

So, how do these challenges get solved or mitigated? It requires a coordinated national effort to address the number of challenges to society, the economy, health of the state, and cultural ethos.

[2in2out]

This is an interesting new study out that reinforces the protections masks provide and their ability to flatten the curve.

https://apple.news/A5kUJJIrlRH2Bdt7qhnTUTw

And this newly posted non-peer reviewed study that suggests that more people have prevalence of antibodies than anticipated. It also suggests in ideal conditions, acquired immunity may last up to a year. I’m cautious of this because it hasn’t been peer reviewed, and some may use the conclusions to support no longer using effective controls.

https://apple.news/A0C8GHCJdR0yaBnYx9OC0ew


https://apple.news/A0C8GHCJdR0yaBnYx9OC0ew

[Zog]

A cold is a communicable disease, requiring that if it was acquired during the course of work, it should be a covered and compensable exposure. Because treatment rarely requires other than self care, an exam by a medical provider and prescribed amount of days off, along with follow-up visit to release the employee back to work.

Being an employer sucks when you learn and understand your responsibilities under “community right to know” law. Employees and customers also have a responsibility, but to a lesser degree. The largest problem with this is the determination of where and who you acquired the communicable disease. With thing like TB, MRSA, and HIV these are fairly easy to chase down in the healthcare setting. They occur in well defined populations and locations. Contract tracing is easy in this regard.

I had a colleague at a previous job who was placed in a hazardous position and contracted hepatitis. He hired a lawyer and was able to get a good settlement out of the company for his lifelong condition.

OSHA gets involved when there are hazardous conditions associated with employment and attempt to minimize risks associated with those exposures. Disease is a hazard of many occupations and the appropriate safeguards are in place for most of these. What we saw with slaughterhouses at the start of the epidemic was insufficient protections for employees. They were spaced too closely together, there was inadequate screening, they had inadequate PPE. They have made a lot of adjustments to their operations as a result, in conjunction with review from OSHA. These facilities all have OSHA reportable due to the exposure of their employees and they are taking it very seriously now.

[2in2out]

This study (non-peer reviewed) suggest men surge with antibodies upon infection, but drop precipitously after. Women tend to have a more mediated and stable antibody response, suggesting that men may need more frequent vaccination, and thus may be at higher risk of reinfection.

https://apple.news/A_WJJzNakSDanl-krts8uGQ

A previous study I am unable to find suggested that male immunity wanes faster because of the lack of encoding information on the Y chromosome reduces a certain protein synthesis. Increased amounts of testosterone, a corticosteroid, harbor the protein making it available during the initial stages of antibody production, thus boosting levels of antibodies. Corticosteroids have been shown to be an effective treatment against COVID symptoms.

[sandm]

I need to take a step back with osha and get what they are doing. zog points out a business that likely needed to have someone come in and correct deficiencies and that's what osha should be for. the businesses that choose to create unsafe conditions. but to shift ALL blame to ALL employers is opening up a legal mess imo and another way for those that choose not to take their own health and safety seriously a way to collect a windfall.
for us here, we have 150+/- working daily in our 250,000sqft warehouse. I have 95 on my shift. masks are mandatory for entrance. we temp check(although imo that's a waste of time), we have a deep cleaning crew on saturdays come in and spend 10hrs deep cleaning ALL areas of the warehouse. we have temps on each shift wiping down all knobs/bathrooms/breakrooms/railings/etc an average of 10x per shift. eliminated all start of shift meetings and a few others. we are likely going above and beyond what most are doing in our valley.
I still see associates going to lunch riding in other cars with people they don't live with and as soon as they open the door to get in off go the masks. osha will likely determine that contact was "at work" but we cannot control every aspect of contact and at what point do people need to take accountability for their own actions. employers can only be held so far and if doing the right things, people can't expect an employer to do everything for them. but that's not where we are at in the world today.

there was a lawsuit that made a quick stint on the news 6 months ago here. landscaper had 1 associate. associate contracts virus. stated he got it from a client while doing landscaping work for owner. due to covid, owner's business is down 60%. when associate comes back from quarantine, owner lays him off. never hires a replacement as business is still down. associate hires lawyer to sue for backpay while quarantining and reinstatement or cash settlement.
osha would probably come in and say owner didn't do enough to protect associate. which would then lead to payout. which might then lead to reinstatement of job when owner can't afford to pay. associate knows virus is around. masks were mandatory at that time. not sure if associate/owner were wearing them but at what point does the asssociate need to take responsibility for his own health/safety.

[sandm]

something else to ponder over:

amazon has been in the news almost daily for rona issues in their warehouses. I have hired several from local amazon locations in the last few months. all say they are required to wear masks, sanitizing is happening to their satisfaction and state that the company in these locations here are doing what they can to provide a good place to work BUT with volumes increasing and headcounts at amazon up more than 30% over last years' counts, the buildings are "packed with people" making social distancing next to impossible.
the US has all come to expect and demand amazon deliver in 10 minutes and if it takes days, everyone is up in arms. buildings are already running 24/7/365 and adding labor is the only way to increase capacity.

what do you do.

[2in2out]

...but at what point does the asssociate need to take responsibility for his own health/safety.

I would expect the court to determine it was at the declaration of local or state emergency, notification of guidance, and governors mask mandate. If the employee willfully disregarded suggested protections, then the employee owns the risk. If the employer didn’t require the associate to wear a mask and remain 6 ft or more during prolonged contact with the customer (which was the guidance then), the employer can be found at fault. Also, during this time, only essential businesses (this is a broad and relatively non-descript category) identified in the governors declaration were supposed to be operating. Dependent on the timeline of when Nevada left phase 1 and into phase 2, the employer could also face blame for operating outside of prescription.

[2in2out]

something else to ponder over:

amazon has been in the news almost daily for rona issues in their warehouses. I have hired several from local amazon locations in the last few months. all say they are required to wear masks, sanitizing is happening to their satisfaction and state that the company in these locations here are doing what they can to provide a good place to work BUT with volumes increasing and headcounts at amazon up more than 30% over last years' counts, the buildings are "packed with people" making social distancing next to impossible.
the US has all come to expect and demand amazon deliver in 10 minutes and if it takes days, everyone is up in arms. buildings are already running 24/7/365 and adding labor is the only way to increase capacity.

what do you do.

That is a relevant and concerned struggle. The employees bear the physical risk of such a situation. You in middle management bear physical, legal, future employment, and emotional risk. I know because I am in middle management. While executive management has fiduciary and legal risk.

To reduce the risk means modifying expectations. Which is easier to modify? Customer expectation, shareholder expectation, square footage, or hygiene theater.

All you can do is push up recommendations to get square footage. Consumer expectations vacillate daily. Shareholder expectations never change. Crappy position and I don’t envy you.