Trump's COVID-19 Diagnosis Raises Questions About What to Do if Your Boss Won't Wear a Mask
Troutman Pepper Counsel Tracey Diamond was quoted in the October 2, 2020 USA Today article, “ Trump's COVID-19 Diagnosis Raises Questions About What to Do if Your Boss Won't Wear a Mask.”
"Where it becomes fuzzy is what does that mean,'' says Tracey Diamond, counsel in the labor and employment practice group at the law firm Troutman Pepper.
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“The first course of action is to try to sit down with the employer ... and discuss that it’s making them uncomfortable that the workplace is not following (Centers for Disease Control and Prevention) guidance, or local or state guidance or mandates,'' says Diamond.
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Request accommodation
If an employee has a health condition or disability, the Americans with Disabilities Act allows them to ask for accommodation that could enhance their safety.
"Those kinds of requests are handled on a case-by-case basis and are dependent on the facts of the situation,'' Diamond says. But accommodation could range from being allowed to work from home, to being isolated from colleagues in an office, or even a leave of absence.
File a complaint
If your concerns aren't being addressed, file a complaint with OSHA, which will typically alert your employer and will sometimes even visit the workplace for an investigation, Diamond says. An employee could also register a
complaint with the local health department or state attorney general's office.