The Biden administration has issued guidelines for agencies to test their employees ’COVID-19s, explaining when widespread testing is appropriate, and confirming that federal offices may require employee testing.
Federal employees who have a test requirement to enter their workplace and refuse may face “consequences,” according to the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention, though they did not specify how these could be and he said all facets of testing policy corresponded to individual agencies. . CDC issued the guide in response to an executive order from President Biden, which stressed that it consisted of strategies for agencies to consider rather than policy requirements.
The CDC noted that the Americans with Disabilities Act allows for tests of workers required by the employer if they are “work-related and consistent with business needs” and the Equal Employment Opportunity Commission has considered acceptable for COVID-19 testing to be a condition for entering a workplace. . Agencies must have the consent of an employee to administer a test and predetermine any consequences for those who reject. CDC encouraged federal agencies to “consider providing alternatives as viable and appropriate” for employees who disagree with the evidence, such as reassigning them tasks that can be completed remotely.
Agencies have several options for pursuing a testing strategy. A less aggressive approach would allow them to test only employees who had symptoms or had a known exposure to someone with COVID-19. Agencies should determine in advance where they will send employees to testing, how they will cover costs, their plans to report results to local health departments, how they will track contacts, and their modified work plans if produces an outbreak. CDC stated that any employee exposed to work should receive a test at a suitable place and time and at no personal cost.
Some federal offices should set up screening tests, which are likely to occur at regular intervals and use antigen testing with faster results. All employees in a workplace with this strategy, even those without symptoms or exposures, would be tested. Federal offices should consider the approach if they are in areas with high community outreach or without easy access to health care, or if their employees have frequent interaction with the public, physical distancing is difficult, continuity of operations is especially critical or its staff is considered high -Risk for serious illness of the virus. Agencies that establish on-site testing capacity must receive a waiver from the Food and Drug Administration.
CDC stressed that any testing strategy should complement, not replace, existing COVID-19 protocols established by agencies. In January the Office of Management and Budgets issued revised pandemic requirements for agencies, including mask mandates at federal offices and ensuring they do not exceed 25% of capacity in areas with widespread community outreach. . The General Services Administration previously issued guidelines for reorganizing federal buildings to make them safer to reopen during the pandemic. A task force set up by Biden to monitor the safety and health of the federal workforce in the midst of the pandemic ordered agencies to pursue employee discipline for refusing to wear a mask to their workplaces.
CDC recommended a broader testing strategy for specific workforce, such as air traffic controllers, those in common living spaces, such as firefighters, and those most critical to government operations. He noted that the guidance was not intended for health care federates, long-term care centers or prisons or detention centers. He also declined to comment on how to fund the evidence issued by the agency.
Agencies are responsible for providing their employees with information about the tests they administer, including manufacturer, type, purpose, who pays for it, how they will receive the results, and who will see the results. CDC encouraged agencies to provide flexible, non-punitive sick leave and other “support policies” for any employee who is asked to isolate. Agencies should continue to ask employee screening questions that inform their workplaces, perform temperature checks, improve ventilation, require masks, and apply physical distancing measures.
While the guidelines did not require any testing by federal agencies, the CDC noted that an advantage of this approach would allow them to reduce employee quarantines below the recommended 14 days. Negative tests after exposure would allow employees to return to work more quickly.
Hundreds of thousands of federal employees have tested positive for COVID-19, but securing such tests has sometimes been difficult for agencies or workers. The Department of Veterans Affairs had to back down in a statement last year that any employee who wanted to take a test could get one after employees across the country disputed it. Like the big American publicity, the federal staff is increasingly vaccinated against COVID-19. Five federal agencies have received direct dose allocations to vaccinate their employees and, in some cases, to help vaccinate other federal staff, and the Biden administration recently created a vaccination site in Maryland specifically for federal employees. Although employees of some agencies expressed their concerns, their agencies struggled to get them vaccinated, now all adults in the United States across the country can sign up for an appointment with the vaccine.