The Mine Safety and Health Administration (MSHA) has updated its guidance for employers to protect mine workers from COVID-19 infections but continues to weigh whether to issue a binding safety standard for the pandemic at mines, even as OSHA is widely expected to unveil such a rule within days.
Workers at an Amazon warehouse in New York are asking a federal appeals court to hold that even a binding OSHA COVID-19 standard would not preempt their claims that the retail giant violated state pandemic safety mandates, despite a district judge’s ruling that such protections are part of OSHA’s “primary jurisdiction.”
Republicans on a House appropriations panel used a recent hearing on worker-safety issues in meat and poultry plants to call for an increased focus on vaccinating workers in the sector against COVID-19 as a better strategy than a strict OSHA standard, signaling how conservatives could seek to counter the agency’s imminent rule.
Republicans on the House labor panel are urging OSHA to reach out to employers as it crafts a widely expected emergency temporary standard (ETS) for COVID-19, warning that rules based on outdated science could have an “adverse impact” on workplace infection controls.
A Department of Labor Office of Inspector General (OIG) report faulting OSHA for reducing workplace inspections during the COVID-19 pandemic highlights the need for the agency to swiftly develop an emergency temporary standard (ETS) to control the spread of the virus among employees, according to a top House Democrat.
A California superior court judge is rejecting industry calls for a preliminary injunction blocking the enforcement of California OSHA’s (Cal/OSHA) COVID-19 worker health and safety emergency temporary standard (ETS) adopted last year, while also saying the plaintiff groups are unlikely to prevail on the merits of the case.
Unions, worker safety groups and others are calling on the Biden administration to update public-health guidance on COVID-19 to explicitly acknowledge that the coronavirus spreads through aerosols -- a step they say would immediately lead to stricter workplace infection controls.
A California state senator is advancing legislation to bolster California OSHA (Cal/OSHA) enforcement measures to protect workers from COVID-19, provide new tools to hold large employers accountable for workplace health and safety violations, and encourage workers to report unsafe working conditions while preventing employer retaliation.
New York is suing Amazon over what it claims is the retail giant’s failure to protect workers from COVID-19 at its facilities in New York City, creating another front in the wide-ranging court battle over whether OSHA’s “primary jurisdiction” over workplace safety preempts states’ enforcement of their pandemic rules.
OSHA is maintaining its defense of a Trump-era decision not to take enforcement action against a Pennsylvania meat-packing plant over conditions workers say pose an “imminent” threat of COVID-19 infection, even as the Biden administration is vowing to pursue stricter workplace safeguards and enforcement during the pandemic.