The Health and Safety Executive (HSE) have indicated that they require certain cases of COVID-19 to be reported under the Reporting or Injuries Diseases and Dangerous Occurrences Regulations (RIDDOR).
Specifically they have indicated the following circumstances when a RIDDOR report must be made:
- an unintended incident at work has led to someone’s possible or actual exposure to coronavirus. This must be reported as a dangerous occurrence.
- a worker has been diagnosed as having COVID-19 and there is reasonable evidence that it was caused by exposure at work. This must be reported as a case of disease.
- a worker dies as a result of occupational exposure to coronavirus.
Full details of the HSE’s update with regards to the reporting of COVID-19 can be found at the following link: https://www.hse.gov.uk/news/riddor-reporting-coronavirus.htm
The difficulty for the Employer will be to determine whether the exposure occurred within the workplace and was therefore occupational related. These are already challenging times for Employers however if you become aware that one of the above conditions have occurred you will need to ensure that a RIDDOR report is made out in the relevant time frame.
We are open as usual and are available at all times to discuss any incidents that you think may have occurred in your workplace. Please contact us to discuss further.