As a person of faith, I believe in our the interdependence of all life. What we do to one we do to all.  In the case of Covid-19 we are learning that "we are all in this together."  How we treat our workers is how we are treating and taking care of our entire Commonwealth. Therefore I am writing to express my strong support for the Governor's and the Department of Labor and Industries' proposed regulations to protect workers in their jobs against Covid-19.  While some workplaces are providing necessary protections, this is not uniformly true for all workplaces.  Regulations to assure safety for workers is needed for the sake of the health of our workers and the health of our entire Commonwealth.  Identification of standard procedures to prevent, or mitigate, the spread of the virus, appropriate for different levels of risk in the workplace, are needed to help employers use the best practices available. Employees need to be educated about the importance of compliance with these procedures. Procedures to assure that known COVID-19 employees as well as asymptomatic or suspected COVID-19 employees are identitified and required to remain away from work until cleared to re-enter the workplace need to be in place.  Our essential workers and those returning to work need to be able to be confident that they will be notified within 24 hours if co-workers have tested positive for the virus. Our essential and returning workers need to be confident that every effort to protect their safety is being taken. Their frontline service to the larger community needs to be respected with every effort to assure as much safety as possible.

Thank you for hearing my views!

Dr. Sally Johnston