On June 3, 2021, California’s Occupational Safety & Healthy Standards Board approved significant revisions to the initial COVID-19-related Emergency Temporary Standards (ETS) originally implemented on November 19, 2020 (see Perkins Coie’s previous blog post here). The amended regulations can be found here and will likely become effective on June 15, 2021, pending review by the California Office of Administrative Law—to be completed within 10 days—and will stay in place for 180 days.
Los Angeles County Will Issue Revised Targeted Safer at Home Order Effective November 30, 2020 to December 20, 2020
Los Angeles County will issue a Revised Health Officer Order to be effective on Monday, November 30, 2020. The press release about the order provides that residents are advised to stay home as much as possible and wear face coverings when outside their household and around others. A summary of the Targeted Temporary Safer at
SB 1159 Expands Presumption of Workers’ Compensation liability for COVID-19 Illness in California
On September 17, 2020, California Governor Gavin Newsom signed Senate Bill 1159 (SB-1159), which eases workers’ compensation requirements for employees who contract COVID-19 on the job. SB 1159 extends protections similar to Governor Newsom’s Executive Order N-62-20, which expired on July 5, 2020. SB-1159 takes effect immediately through January 1, 2023.
Under SB-1159, for purposes of workers’ compensation, a compensable workplace “injury” now includes illness or death from COVID-19 under specified circumstances. In contrast to existing law, which requires most employees to prove they suffered an injury or illness in the course of employment, an employee is presumed to have contracted COVID-19 on the job if there was an outbreak where they work. It is thus up to the employer to rebut the “disputable presumption,” and the bill specified ways to do so.