Omicron Checklist For Employers by CAMEO

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Enhanced Protections to Help Meet This Moment

“Whether your company already has a vaccination policy in place or not, here are steps you can take right now to protect the health of your workers and your business:

1. Make it easier for employees to get vaccinated and boosted, either on-site at the workplace or in the community, by offering paid time off for vaccinations and recovery. Make it easier for working parents to vaccinate eligible children (5 and up for vaccination; 12 and up for boosters).
   

2. Consider weekly testing for all employees, regardless of vaccination status, at in-person job sites.
   

3. Help your workers access free at-home tests. Beginning today, January 18, every home in the U.S. can order four free at-⁠home COVID-⁠19 tests through covidtests.gov. Those tests will be completely free—no shipping costs, no need to enter a credit card number.
   

4. Help your workers navigate reimbursable home tests. As of January 15, private health insurers are required to cover the costs of up to eight COVID-19 tests per month. Make sure employees know what your health plans require of them, which may include keeping the test box, as well as receipts, or buying from in-network stores. (For workers who may not have private health insurance, employers should consider covering the cost of weekly testing.)
   

5. Support employees’ ability to quarantine for five days if they have been exposed by allowing them to stay away from others. Encourage them to wear a well-fitting mask, even after five days of isolation.
   

6. Support employees’ ability to isolate if they are sick or test positive, even if they do not have symptoms. And again, encourage them to wear a well-fitting mask, after those five days of isolation.
   

7. Implement social distancing in all communal work areas for unvaccinated and otherwise at-risk workers.
   

8. Require a mask indoors and provide workers with well-fitting masks. N95 and KN95-rated masks are the most effective.
   

9. Communicate your COVID-19 policies and procedures using accessible formats and in languages they understand.
   

10. Maintain and improve ventilation systems. Proper ventilation can be another part of your strategy to reduce the concentration of viral particles in the air.
    

11. Perform routine cleaning and disinfection. If someone who has been in the workplace within 24 hours has tested positive for COVID-19 or has COVID-19 symptoms, follow the CDC cleaning and disinfection recommendations.
    

12. Record and report COVID-19 infections and deaths to local public health authorities.
    

13. Implement protections from retaliation and set up an anonymous process for workers to voice concerns about COVID-19-related hazards.”