The Basic 4 of COVID-19 Risk Mitigation Strategies: Recap.

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Here is a recap of this week's review and overview of the four basics of risk mitigation (as depicted in TAG’s COVID-19 Preventive Control Pyramid (find this and other posters for download here):

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1. Employee Wellness Checks

2. Social Distancing and Hygiene

3. Enhanced Cleaning and Disinfection

4. Non-medical masks or Face coverings

 

Although the COVID-19 outbreak seems to be stabilizing in some areas of the world, the rate of spread is continuing to increase in the U.S. and is creating a new normal for businesses; TAG foresees “the new normal” continuing for the next 4 to 6 months. Thus, it is critical that your businesses continue to employ the four basic preventive practices to protect your workforce and your operations.  

 

1. Employee Wellness Checks. TAG recommends that all companies institute active employee screening processes. Upon employee arrival, and periodically through the day:

• Ask ALL employees daily questions about their current health, travel, and close contacts.

• Include questions on primary symptoms (fever, cough, difficulty breathing) and secondary symptoms (loss of smell or taste (anosmia), tiredness or fatigue, sore throat, headache, gastrointestinal illness (diarrhea) experienced in the last 24 hours.

• Ask if the employee been exposed to a person (someone in their household, intimate partner, or close-contact) with symptomatic COVID-19 during the period from 48 hours before symptoms onset throughout the period of symptoms. 

• Conduct daily, or more frequent, temperature checks. Non-contact infrared thermometers (NCITs) are becoming more commonplace, so are recommended if available and appropriate.

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2. Social Distancing and Hygiene includes two parts:

• Social distancing: maintaining 6 feet (2 meters) of distance between workers to keep them separated and help prevent COVID-19-infected persons from infecting others. While this can be difficult in some food production settings, strategies like staggering shift and break times, reducing the number of chairs in break rooms, adding barriers wherever possible, increasing production shifts, and/or slowing the line so workers can be farther apart are effective measures. Placing social distancing posters as reminders around your facility can be helpful. Download the posters in English, Spanish, Portuguese, French, Chinese, and Vietnamese, here.

• Personal hygiene including frequent handwashing and avoiding touching of the face, nose, eyes, and mouth. Doing both helps ensure against any hand contact with infectious droplets being transferred through the nose, eyes and mouth if accidentally touched. Hands should be washed with soap and water for at least 20 seconds. If washing with soap and water is impossible, use an alcohol-based hand sanitizer that contains at least 60% alcohol. If hands are visibly soiled (with dirt, oil or grease), soap and water should be used before applying an alcohol-based hand sanitizer.

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3. Enhanced Cleaning and Disinfection. To mitigate the COVID-19 risk through enhanced cleaning and sanitation, TAG recommends frequent cleaning of all common areas (breakrooms, lunchrooms, bathrooms, meeting rooms, etc.) throughout an office or facility while using Proper PPE (gloves, disposable gowns, and goggles/face-shields) before a shift change, before and after breaks, before and after meals, after a shift change. Pay closest attention to areas of likely contamination and hand contact surfaces, for example toilets, bathroom floors and walls, doorknobs, sinks, taps, benches, handrails, phones, light switches, shared keyboards and touchscreens, forklift controls, hand tools, etc. Use products, preferably wipes, ready to use (RTU) or dilutable products in spray bottles from EPA’s list of Disinfectants for Use Against SARS-CoV-2 (List N) or 0.1% household bleach (sodium hypochlorite) solution, and/or 70% alcohol.

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4. Masks and Face Coverings. To reflect the evolving epidemiology of the COVID-19 outbreak, TAG recommends that non-medical grade masks or homemade masks be used by all employees in a food facility. A recent article in the Lancet supports this rationale, stating, “As evidence suggests COVID-19 could be transmitted before symptom onset, community transmission might be reduced if everyone, including people who have been infected but are asymptomatic and contagious, wear face masks.” The primary goal of widespread mask usage is to reduce droplet spread throughout the facility and reduce the risk of transmission by contagious asymptomatic employees. Be sure to follow proper donning and doffing procedures; our Proper Mask and Face Coverings Usage Poster is available for download.

 

If you have any trouble with any of the resources, please contact us to let us know!