By now, California employers are quite familiar with the following situation: the California Department of Public Health (CDPH) makes a change to COVID-19 guidance, and your workplace obligations are affected under Cal/OSHA’s COVID-19 regulations. CDPH has done it again, but this time in a manner that will benefit employers in the state.
Previously, CDPH and Cal/OSHA had defined a COVID-19 “outbreak” as three or more cases in an exposed group during a 14-day period. An employer in an “outbreak” had to follow additional requirements under the Cal/OSHA COVID-19 nonemergency regulation until there are one or fewer COVID-19 cases for a 14-day period. The CDPH changed its definition of “outbreak” to mean three or more cases during a seven-day period. This change is automatically incorporated into the Cal/OSHA regulation, which the agency confirmed in an updated FAQ.
The bottom line for California employers is that it will now be harder to officially be considered in “outbreak” status, which triggers additional obligations under the Cal/OSHA regulation.
Once you are considered in “outbreak” under the Cal/OSHA standard, you have additional obligations including the following:
- Making testing available immediately and weekly thereafter to all employees within the exposed group.
- Ensuring that close contacts have a negative COVID-19 test taken within three to five days after the close contact or exclude them from work and follow return-to-work criteria.
- Requiring that employees in the exposed group wear face coverings when indoors, or when outdoor and less than six feet from another person.
- Notifying employees of the right to request and receive a respirator for voluntary use.
- Undertaking additional COVID-19 investigation, review, and hazard correction.
- Improving ventilation, using a MERV-13 filter or highest compatible efficiency.
- Reporting to local public health departments, if applicable.
You should review your local public health department outbreak reporting requirements (if any) to see if they align with the new CDPH definition of “outbreak.” In addition, don’t forget that employers that have 20 or more cases in a 30-day period are considered in “major outbreak” and have additional responsibilities under the Cal/OSHA non-emergency regulation.
Benjamin M. Ebbink is an attorney with Fisher Phillips in Sacramento, Calif. © 2023. All rights reserved. Reprinted with permission.
