On September 9, 2021, the White House issued Path Out of the Pandemic: President Biden’s COVID-19 Action Plan (the Plan). The Plan outlines a six-pronged approach, portions of which will impose new obligations on employers across the country.

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In June, with much fanfare, California announced it was reopening and lifting many of the COVID-19 restrictions that had been in place through state executive and health department orders. However, as there have been surges of COVID-19 across the state, many state and local orders requiring COVID-19 controls have changed in response. Mask mandates and

As Occupational Safety and Health Administration (“OSHA”) evaluates amending the Hazard Communication Standard (“HCS”), 29 CFR 1910.1200, both industry and work safety groups continue to warn that the proposed changes go too far. Although couched as simple changes that will bring the standard in alignment with international standards for management of hazardous materials, the

The Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) has offered new COVID-19 guidance indicating that fully vaccinated individuals no longer need to wear masks or maintain physical distance from others in most settings. However, questions about employers’ compliance obligations and general duty expectations under the Occupational Safety and Health Act of 1970 (OSH Act) remain.

Since the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) offered new COVID-19 guidance allowing fully vaccinated individuals to avoid wearing masks or socially distancing in most settings, employers have been pushing the Occupational Safety and Health Administration (OSHA) and state equivalents to embrace the change, but change is slow.

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On May 20th, the Cal/OSHA Standards Board will consider changes to COVID-19 Emergency Temporary Standards (“ETS”).

The proposed changes would still require employers to have an established written COVID-19 Prevention Program (“CPP”) that covers everything from training and communication with employees to the investigation of COVID-19 cases in the workplace.

However, there are

As the federal government and state of California adjusted their COVID-19 guidance for vaccinated individuals, Cal OSHA remained silent on how vaccination affected the requirements under its COVID-19 Emergency Temporary Standard (ETS). While there had been discussions of revisions to the ETS, it was unclear if Cal OSHA would be able to release such

The coronavirus (“COVID-19”) pandemic has continued to evolve, with COVID-19 cases declining in some areas and vaccinations being rolled out in phases by local public health authorities. Yet widespread vaccinations are not expected to be in place until later in 2021, with many Americans not having access to vaccines until May or June at the

It has been three months since California approved the Division of Occupational Safety and Health’s (“Cal OSHA”) COVID-19 Emergency Temporary Standard (“ETS”). The rushed implementation of Cal OSHA’s ETS, which imposed new and confusing obligations on employers, left many scratching their heads and resulted in several legal challenges to the ETS. For example, some