Do you need to close your business if you have a COVID-19 case at work? And do you have an isolation space set up if a worker shows up sick?

While WA’s hard border has kept COVID-19 at bay in our State, it’s still essential that employers have a COVID-19 incident response in place and communicated.

Senior Consultant, Safety and Risk Services Rachael Lincoln says businesses need to consider the resources they’ll need to implement a response.

“If you can reasonably suspect an employee may have COVID-19, or have been exposed, this creates a health risk at your workplace,” she says.

Safe Work Australia lists the actions business owners or managers must take if an employee suspected of being infected with COVID-19 shows up at work here.

Federal Finance Minister Mathias Cormann recently raised his concerns about WA’s hard border policy directly with the business community at the CCIWA’s recent Federal Budget Briefing breakfast event.

“One of the concerns I’ve got, in a West Australian context, is because we’ve got this, I don’t want to call it false sense of security, but perhaps, somewhat inflated sense of security from the border,” he said.

“If there was an incursion, or if there was an outbreak, I don’t think that we are as prepared as we could be as we should be to deal with it.

“We haven’t really set up the system and processes to minimize the risk and to respond to it as swiftly as we can.