In light of Covid-19, OSHA exercises its regulatory authority to provide employers and staff with certainty. OSHA must also implement the record keeping provisions of 29 CFR 1904 for COVID-19 illnesses of workers for all employers according to its guidelines until further notice. Under its Memorandum “Revised Enforcement Guidance for Recording Cases of Coronavirus Disease 2019 (COVID-19)”, Recording a COVID-19 disease does not mean that the employer has violated any OSHA norm. Under existing regulations, employers with 10 or fewer employees and some employers in low-risk industries have no recording obligations; however, they only need to report work-related COVID-19 diseases that lead to fatality or hospitalization, amputation or l for an employee. In any event, it is critical for an employer to investigate COVID-19 cases among employees as a matter of worker health and safety as well as public health, and to respond appropriately to protect workers, regardless of whether a case is eventually determined to be work-related.
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