The California Division of Occupational Safety and Health is drafting revisions to its emergency temporary standards for COVID-19 workplace safety in light of the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention’s latest guidance that permits vaccinated individuals to forgo masks indoors, according to a Cal/OSHA memo issued Wednesday.
In the memo, Cal/OSHA asked the Occupational Safety and Health Standards Board to postpone its own vote on updating the mask guidance for employers — which would have put employers in line with the CDC and the state’s announcement that mask mandates would be lifted June 15 — and allow it time to “present a new proposal at a future meeting.”
Cal/OSHA said in the memo that it will “limit any potential changes to consideration of the recent guidance, in order to make possible a targeted effective date of June 15.”
The new draft language is expected to be posted on May 28 and a public hearing is slated for June 3, according to an email from Cal/OSHA.
More insurance and workers compensation news on the coronavirus crisis here.
The early implementation of a universal face mask policy at a Michigan medical center at the start of the pandemic resulted in a reduced risk to health care workers of acquiring COVID-19, according to a study released Friday by Detroit-based Henry Ford Health System.