Washington — Newly launched laws would direct OSHA to situation a regular requiring employers within the health care and social service sector to develop and implement a office violence prevention plan.
Announced April 18 by Sen. Tammy Baldwin (D-WI) and Rep. Joe Courtney (D-CT), the Workplace Violence Prevention of Health Care and Social Service Workers Act (S. 1176 and H.R. 2663) additionally calls on OSHA to situation an interim customary inside one yr of enactment, and a ultimate rule inside 42 months.
Employers can be required to:
- Develop processes to establish and reply to dangers and hazards that make settings susceptible to violence.
- Implement protocols to doc and examine acts of violence.
- Create an atmosphere that helps staff who report violent incidents, together with non-retaliation insurance policies.
- Ensure staff are appropriately skilled in figuring out and addressing hazards, and their rights concerning office violence.
The bill would cowl quite a lot of workplaces, together with residential and nonresidential therapy services, psychiatric therapy services, group care settings, house care, home-based hospice, and substance use dysfunction therapy facilities.
According to the Bureau of Labor Statistics, in 2020, health care and social services staff comprised 76% of all victims of office violence leading to nonfatal accidents.
“No worker – especially those we rely on for care – should be injured or killed on the job,” Courtney mentioned in a press launch. “This legislation would put proven tactics into practice in hospitals and health care settings across the country to prevent violence before it happens.”
In a separate launch, Emergency Nurses Association President Terry Foster urges Congress to behave now. “Continued violence against emergency nurses or any health care worker is neither normal nor acceptable, under any circumstance, yet the problem has gone unabated to the point of it becoming a crisis.”
Numerous different associations and labor teams are backing the bill, together with National Nurses United; the Academy of Medical-Surgical Nurses; the American Federation of State, County and Municipal Employees; the National Association of Social Workers; the American Psychiatric Association; and the American Federation of Teachers.
“Workplace violence in the health care industry was rampant before COVID-19, with the pandemic only exacerbating the safety issues facing frontline workers,” AFT President Randi Weingarten mentioned. “It’s why Rep. Courtney and Sen. Baldwin’s bill addressing workplace violence is so crucial.”
