• Employers should grant paid time off for employees to be vaccinated against COVID-19.
• Employers should encourage COVID-19 testing and instruct employees to stay home if they test positive or have close contact with an infected person.
• Physical distancing and shields/barriers may be used to keep employees from infecting each other.

Employers should grant paid time off for employees to get vaccinated. The Department of Labor and the Occupational Safety and Health Administration (OSHA), as well as other federal agencies, are working diligently to ensure access to COVID-19 vaccinations. The Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) provides information on the benefits and safety of vaccinations. Businesses with fewer than 500 employees may be eligible for tax credits under the American Rescue Plan (ARP) if they provide paid time off for employees who decide to receive the vaccine and to recover from any potential side effects from the vaccine.

Employers should instruct any workers who are infected, unvaccinated workers who have had close contact with someone who tested positive for SARS-CoV-2, and all workers with COVID-19 symptoms to stay home from work to prevent or reduce the risk of transmission of the virus that causes COVID-19. Employers should ensure that absence policies are non-punitive, and eliminate or revise policies that encourage workers to come to work sick or when unvaccinated workers have been exposed to COVID-19.

Employers should implement physical distancing for unvaccinated and otherwise at-risk workers in all communal work areas. A keyway to protect unvaccinated or otherwise at-risk workers is to physically distance them from other unvaccinated or otherwise at-risk people (workers or customers) — generally at least 6 feet of distance is recommended, although this is not a guarantee of safety, especially in enclosed or poorly ventilated spaces.

Employers could also limit the number of unvaccinated or otherwise at-risk workers in one place at any given time, for example by implementing flexible worksites (e.g., telework); implementing flexible work hours (e.g., rotate or stagger shifts to limit the number of such workers in the workplace at the same time); delivering services remotely (e.g., phone, video, or web); or implementing flexible meeting and travel options, all for such workers.

At fixed workstations where unvaccinated or otherwise at-risk workers are not able to remain at least 6 feet away from other people, transparent shields or other solid barriers (e.g., fire resistant plastic sheeting or flexible strip curtains) can separate these workers from other people. Barriers should block face-to-face pathways between individuals in order to prevent direct transmission of respiratory droplets, and any openings should be placed at the bottom and made as small as possible. The posture (sitting or standing) of users and the safety of the work environment should be considered when designing and installing barriers, as should the need for enhanced ventilation.