And this when we still have a pandemic virus currently circulating?
All staff, every last person working in a hospital should be provided with N95 respiratory protection.
OSHA – By Standard Number 1910.134 – Respiratory protection. 1910.134(a)(2) A respirator shall be provided to each employee when such equipment is necessary to protect the health of such employee.
Every last person working in an environment that’s high risk for aerosol transmission of disease as a workplace hazard should be offered respiratory protection and fit-testing. That’s all over a hospital, because patients and healthcare workers are breathing the same air traveling through hallways all over facilities. Frankly it was always the case with other pathogens that put already vulnerable people at risk, and now, because of lack of community based mitigations, covid might be present anywhere.
Hospital corporations choosing to not allow or provide fit-testing to all employees should certainly not be used as an excuse not to provide N95s to healthcare workers or to deny people accommodation in healthcare settings. But, apparently that’s what’s happening in some places. This is the response given to someone after asking for ADA accommodation for the staff to wear N95 respirator masks during a medical procedure in a Massachusetts hospital:
In regards to your request that all providers and staff at the Surgical Center wear an N95 mask, this request cannot be accommodated. At the current time, physicians and staff are not required to mask in all settings. There are exceptions (i.e. during a surgical procedure, if a patient has respiratory symptoms, or if a patient/staff has had a recent COVID exposure). In addition, not all staff are fit tested for N95 masks. Fit testing is based upon job role and responsibility. Therefore, ensuring that each staff member you come into contact with wears an N95 mask is not a reasonable accommodation.
Clearly pretzel logic – and what, just to cut costs?
The blood lab I was at this summer had to go look for a mask when asked to mask. I’ve heard 2 other stories of when someone asks a healthcare provider to mask they say they have to go find someone to get them one. We’ve been in a prolonged surge, so why aren’t they wearing them by default? At a minimum N95 masks should be available everywhere in healthcare for all staff and all patients.
My letter to reps:
Healthcare providers need to be stopped from using “fit testing” as an excuse to not wear N95 respirator masks as a reasonable accommodation in healthcare to protect vulnerable people and patients undergoing procedures requiring them to be unmasked, and thus making “one way masking” impossible. This is ridiculous. Either make the healthcare providers fit test all their staff and provide N95s to all staff – because all staff should be aerosol transmission pandemic-ready after all, or mandate that there needs to be an exception to this rule for reasonable accommodation. Denying healthcare workers and patients this safety by citing that fit testing in a hospital is not reasonable is itself ridiculous. PPE cannot and should not be considered “unreasonable” in a hospital setting. Respirator masks should be available to all staff and all patients at all times since there’s no shortages anymore and hasn’t been for years now.