A Word Of Caution About The CDC’s New Guidance For The Fully-Vaccinated

On Monday, March 8, the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) issued its first set of guidelines on how fully-vaccinated people can visit safely with others. While this is certainly welcome guidance for our personal lives, it is not a workplace guidance. Instead, it is guidance for visiting in and among households. This guidance does not change any of the COVID-19 mitigation measures employers are using in the workplace.

A person is considered “fully-vaccinated” two weeks after receiving the last required dose of vaccine. The CDC’s guidance addresses how fully-vaccinated people can gather with others safely and provides different guidelines for visiting the unvaccinated and the fully-vaccinated. The CDC “will update these recommendations as more people are vaccinated, rates of COVID-19 in the community change, and additional scientific evidence becomes available.”

The guidance does provide that a fully-vaccinated individual no longer has to quarantine and test if he/she has contact with someone who has COVID-19, as long as the fully-vaccinated person is not displaying any symptoms of COVID-19. This could potentially apply in the workplace but we need additional information from the Governor’s Office and our state health agencies before making any changes to existing workplace mitigation policies and procedures. Hopefully, such guidance will be quickly issued; however, until we receive more clarification, employers should continue with the status quo.

We will keep you updated on this developing matter and are available to answer any questions you have. 

KZA Employer Report articles are for general information only; they are not intended and should not be construed to be legal advice. Reading or replying to such articles does not establish an attorney-client relationship. In addition, because the subject matters and applicable laws discussed in Employer Report articles are often in a state of change and not always applicable to every type of business entity or organization, readers should consult with counsel before making decisions based on the same.