With new measures that prioritize healthcare workers and other specific groups for PCR testing, employers in other industries are having difficulty dealing with positive cases among their employees.
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“It’s excruciatingly complicated. Our employees are obliged to self-manage, to self-diagnose. Worse, it requires that we readjust, we do not have a ton of employee reserve, we have small teams. It means that people isolate themselves, three, four days for nothing, ”explains Amélie Cloutier Bastien, co-owner of the Mère Hélène boutique.
Additionally, not all companies and employees have access to rapid testing.
“Rapid tests are a scarce commodity. We were lucky, most of our employees are mothers of children in elementary school, they had a reserve of five tests, which are quickly exhausted during the holiday season, ”she continues.
According to her, five rapid tests per family is too little.
Employers also have the right to require proof of a positive test for COVID-19, argues lawyer Marianne Plamondon.
“We’ll have to trust the word of the employees. From the moment we face an employee who has an absenteeism problem, or performance issues, the employer may ask for a justification. It is not because we are in a pandemic that the employer cannot ask for proof, ”she explains, confirming that in this case, it is the employee who will have the burden of prove the reason for his absence.
Other workers fear a return to work too early.
Several unions fear that employees will be forced back to work following the five-day isolation period even though they still have several symptoms of COVID.
The labor shortage is putting pressure on employers and employees, it is believed.
“We are afraid that not all employers will put pressure to accelerate the hasty return of workers,” said Denis Bolduc, secretary general of the FTQ.
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