'Shameful Failure': Biden's OSHA Excludes Most Workers From Covid Protections

Scientists and workers' rights advocates were among those late Wednesday who denounced the Biden administration's new workplace safety rules regarding the Covid-19 pandemic, which were unveiled months later than expected and which the Labor Department made enforceable only for healthcare settings—leaving grocery store employees, manufacturing workers, and others vulnerable to the continuing public health crisis, critics said.

 

 

At a Wednesday hearing of the House Education and Labor Committee, Labor Secretary Marty Walsh told lawmakers that the Occupational Safety and Health Administration's (OSHA) final Covid-19 Emergency Temporary Standard (ETS) will apply only to healthcare workplaces, requiring those employers "to provide their workers with a safe and healthful workplace free from recognized hazards that are causing or likely to cause death or serious physical harm."

 

"Except for workplace settings covered by OSHA's ETS and mask requirements for public transportation, most employers no longer need to take steps to protect their workers from Covid-19 exposure in any workplace, or well-defined portions of a workplace, where all employees are fully vaccinated," read OSHA's new guidelines, updated on Thursday. 

 

"Employers should still take steps to protect unvaccinated or otherwise at-risk workers in their workplaces, or well-defined portions of workplaces," the guidance says, but as HuffPost reported, this portion of the guidance is "essentially voluntary."

 

Walsh told members of Congress the Labor Department "tailored a rule that reflects the reality on the ground, the success of all government vaccination efforts, plus the latest guidance from the CDC on the changing nature of the pandemic."

 

"Science tells us that healthcare workers, particularly those who have come into regular contact with people either suspected of having or being treated for Covid-19, are most at risk," said Walsh.