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Understanding uptake of prevention and mitigation of COVID-19 at work actions in Iran
Vahid Gharibi1,2, Rosanna Cousins3, Mehdi Jahangiri1
1Department of Occupational Health, School of Health, Shiraz University of Medical Sciences, Shiraz, Iran.
Background:
The coronavirus disease 2019 (COVID-19) pandemic has required organizations to make changes to ways of working to prevent and mitigate COVID-19 in employees.
Objective:
To assess the workplace response to COVID-19 in Iran.
Methods:
255 organizations completed a two-part survey. Part 1 collected data describing the business; part 2 comprised the International Labor Organization (ILO) 30-item Prevention and Mitigation of COVID-19 at Work Actions Checklist. A four-point Likert scale was used to score each item according to whether preventative measures had been actioned.
Results:
We found a dichotomy of commitment to managing COVID-19 at work. 42.5%of organizations had fully implemented the ILO recommended preventative actions, and 45.6%workplaces had not implemented any. Large organizations had significantly more preventative actions than SMEs; the healthcare sector had significantly better COVID-19 mitigation measures in place than construction projects; and organizations with a health and safety management system had significantly more prevention actions in place.
Conclusions:
ILO provided a good framework to support risk assessment of COVID-19, however only half the organizations were undertaking the necessary biological hazard control actions to prevent COVID-19 at work. There remains a need to understand the inaction of organizations who do not risk assess despite being in a pandemic.
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