Virginia has become the first state in the nation to adopt OSHA workplace safety standards designed specifically to ensure the protection of workers from infection risk.

The new OSHA Covid-19 regulations require that all employers take specific actions in response to those regulations. The state’s Safety and Health Codes Board voted 9-2 Wednesday to adopt the standards.

Business owners are urged to assess their company and employee job risk classification, and the impact of that classification on their obligations, to become aware of what policies they must adopt on reporting and communicating exposures, to control the return to work process of anyone posing a risk of Covid-19 infection to others, to keep employees distanced from each other and the public, to implement engineering, administrative and work practice controls to keep your workplace safe.