The NYS DOL published new regulations, retroactively effective to January 1, 2022, as an emergency rule to implement the New York Health and Essential Rights Act (NY HERO Act).

The regulations requires private sector employers to create an Exposure Prevention Plan to eliminate or minimize employee exposure to airborne infectious disease agents, which includes the COVID-19 virus and its variants.

The measure sets forth requirements that employers select and obtain exposure controls appropriate for the exposure risks. These controls must be included in the employer’s Exposure Prevention Plan. As to the plan, the NYS Department of Health has developed a new Model Airborne Infectious Disease Exposure Prevention Plan (Template) and various industry specific model plans (Templates) for prevention of airborne infectious disease.

Employers must enact compliant plans immediately. 

The New York State Department of Labor has finally issued the long awaited Model Airborne Infectious Disease Exposure Prevention Plan.

As a refresher, on May 5, 2021, Governor Cuomo signed the New York Health and Essential Rights Act ("NY HERO Act") into law requiring employers to take various measures to protect employees in the event of a future airborne infectious disease outbreak. 

One of those measures was to adopt a prevention plan. Now that the NYSDOL released the model plan, employers have until August 5, 2021 to either customize and adopt the model plan or create their own plan which, at a minimum, meets the requirements of the model plan.

While employers must immediately adopt a plan, it is important to note that, per the NYSDOL website, the plan is not currently required to be in effect until the New York State Commissioner of Health designates an infectious disease as a "highly contagious communicable disease that presents a serious risk of harm to the public health."