National COSH Issues Recommendations for a Safe Return to Work

July 1, 2020 Roberta Garthwait

As more non-essential businesses return to work, the National Council for Occupational Safety and Health (National COSH), an advocacy group dedicated to promoting safe and healthy conditions for all working people, has published its own guidelines to ensure employee health and safety.

Based on the National Institute for Occupational Safety and Health’s Hierarchy of Controls, A Safe and Just Return to Work, provides key recommendations that businesses should follow as they begin efforts to reopen. These include:

1. Effective and stringent health and safety protections, informed by science, backed by robust enforcement and designed with meaningful input by workers, worker center/COSH groups, unions and employers
2. A planned, detailed and meaningful system of screening, testing, contact tracing, proper isolation and epidemiological surveillance
3. Guaranteed job protection and just compensation for those working, and for those who can’t
4. Inclusion of and respect for meaningful worker and union involvement in all planning, protocols and decision-making regarding safety in the workplace and return-to-work
5. Measures to ensure equity, inclusion and a path to end health and economic disparities

The report may be viewed at https://www.nationalcosh.org/sites/default/files/SafeAndJustReturnToWork_EN.pdf.