Published in the New Hampshire Business Review (8/11/22)

New guidance narrows employers’ ability to screen employees.

On July 12, 2022, the Equal Employment Opportunity Commission (EEOC) updated its COVID-19 workplace guidance and this article summarizes the key topics that employers should understand.

Return to Work Testing and Documentation

Under the Americans with Disabilities Act (ADA), any medical exam that an employer requires of an employee must be “job-related and consistent with business necessity.” Required COVID testing for employees is considered a “medical exam” and at the onset of the pandemic, the EEOC advised that COVID testing was a business necessity for all employees as an approved method for curbing transmission.

The July 12 guidance narrows what was a broad screening approach and now requires employers to assess whether screening a particular employee is consistent with the prior medical exam standard. The EEOC cautions employers to check with the public health authorities on screening guidelines, which will change depending on the level of virus detected in a particular region. Other factors that implicate “job-related” and “business necessity” include an employee’s vaccine status, the transmissibility of the current variant, contact between others in the workplace, and the impact of a COVID-positive employee on overall operations. In addition, the EEOC has updated its guidance to permit employees to provide an email from a medical provider or time-stamped documentation from a clinic indicating that the employee is at no risk for transmission, given that obtaining a doctor’s note can take a few days.

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