The reopening of work will bring many changes, but one has already started in manufacturing plants and on construction sites and before or after work shifts across Rhode Island.
The taking of body temperatures of employees and visitors, once unheard of, has become a common screening fixture of the workplace.
In the lobby of the downtown skyscraper at 100 Westminster, the headquarters of Paolino Properties LP, people entering must be photographed and recorded by a thermal-imaging camera.
The Seek Scan system, of two tripod-mounted cameras, was purchased by Paolino Properties managing partner Joseph R. Paolino Jr., who said he wanted technology that could help him protect his employees and tenants.
The cameras measure body heat and will indicate if someone has a fever.
“It says if you’re hot or not,” Paolino said. “If it shows you’re hot, we ask you to go through it a second time. If you’re still hot, then we give you a thermometer and we ask you to take your own temperature.”
Still hot? “If you have a fever, we ask you to go see a doctor and go home,” he said.
The screening is not the ultimate solution, given that COVID-19 has numerous symptoms, only one of which is a fever. For Paolino, it’s a start.
Paolino, whose company owns numerous commercial and residential properties in Rhode Island, said he can see this type of testing gaining traction as people return to work. Already, he has had corporations and government entities call him about the system he purchased from California-based Seek Thermal Inc.
“It’s not the cure-all. It’s a guide,” Paolino said. “We’re going to see more of this type of testing and more-advanced testing take place, the way the [Transportation Security Administration] took over after 9/11. We’re going to see the health version of the TSA enter our lives.”
As recently as two months ago, legal experts were advising businesses not to take the temperature of arriving workers over concerns about violating privacy rights.
That was before the World Health Organization declared COVID-19 a pandemic, which led to new guidance for employers seeking to protect their workplaces, according to attorneys.
The Equal Employment Opportunity Commission has since given the green light for employers to take body temperatures.
‘If you have a fever, we ask you to ... go home.’
JOSEPH R. PAOLINO JR., Paolino Properties LP managing partner
Employers can also screen employees by asking them if they are experiencing any symptoms that are associated with the illness, including shortness of breath, coughing, a sore throat, or loss of smell or taste.
Andrew Prescott, a labor and employment law partner for Nixon Peabody LLP in Providence, said he expects that employers will establish a full set of screening measures as employees return to workplaces.
The firm is getting many questions from companies asking about the legality and procedure for temperature checks. Federal and state laws concerning privacy also may apply, so employers should be careful when keeping those records, because they are considered health records, according to Prescott. “If a log is being kept, it can’t be kept in the same file as the personnel file,” he said.
A new employee can be screened for COVID-19 symptoms once a conditional job offer is made. And as part of a preemployment medical exam, an employer can take the newly hired person’s temperature, according to a lengthy blog post written recently by Ali Khorsand, an associate with Adler Pollock & Sheehan PC of Providence.
In the past four weeks, he’s had several inquiries from business clients about how to handle the fever screenings.
“The advice we’re giving everyone is: the employees who are taking the temperatures should be protected, with a shield, wear a mask, or PPE [personal protective equipment] if that’s possible,” Khorsand said.
The thermal-imaging data, he said, could raise issues surrounding data collection and storage. And beyond the temperature screening, can an employer ask an employee to submit to a COVID-19 test before returning to a workplace? Khorsand isn’t sure.
Employers will have to work through those questions, he said.
Mary MacDonald is a PBN staff writer. Contact her at Macdonald@PBN.com.