Google temporarily mandates weekly COVID tests for people visiting its US offices: Report

Tech giant Google on Friday announced a weekly COVID-19 test mandate for all employees or persons entering its offices or facilities in the United States. A memo by the Google office, obtained by CNBC, stated that any person who comes into any US-based site will have to produce a COVID-19 negative molecular test before admitting to the buildings. The new policy implemented in the wake of the skyrocketing COVID-19 cases, coinciding with the Omicron variant, was e-mailed to all full-time employees on Thursday.

The employees and outsiders visiting Google offices in the States will also need to report their vaccination status and wear surgical-grade masks while being at the office premises, the memo forwarded by Google's health chief Karen DeSalvo said.

"The Omicron variant has become the dominant strain in the US and is highly transmissible. There has been a significant rise in infection across the country and COVID hospitals are overwhelmed with COVID patients- reducing the capacity to provide care to others who need it," the memo from Google's Health officer DeSalvo said, CNBC reported.

It is pertinent to mention that, lately, Google has had a more aggressive approach than its peers in implementing COVID-19 safety measures among its employees. The Alphabet Inc. company, last month, directed its workers to adhere to the US President Joe Biden-proposed vaccine policies in order to avoid pay cuts or job loss. The announcement made a major shift on the part of the executives, who had previously stated that the company would not mandate vaccines. The employees had then released a signed memo opposing Google's widened COVID-19 vaccine mandate.

Google develops real-time variant tracking and COVID-19 sequencing

In April, the tech magnate began providing at-home COVID test kits to its employees from Cue Health in a bid to curb in-office transmission of the virus. About four months later, Google Cloud entered into a separate agreement with the private healthcare firm to develop real-time variant tracking and COVID-19 sequencing. The company is expected to continue the process over the next few weeks, DeSalvo said in the memo, as quoted by CNBC.

"During this period of heightened risks, we are making it a matter of policy to get a weekly molecular test (like polymerase chain reaction (PCR)) if one is coming to the office," DeSalvo added.

Meanwhile, Google has also reminded its employees that they could avail at-home test kits and in-person virus testing options for the full-time and extended workforce, including vendors and contractors. The measures are said to make "workplaces and communities as safe as possible," a Google spokesperson had said in an email to CNBC. It is pertinent to mention that the announcement comes as the US on January 13 clocked over 8lakh daily cases, making the total touch 6.45 crore. In addition, with over 2,000 COVID-related deaths on the same day, the US is swiftly moving to touch 9 lakh fatalities since the beginning of the pandemic in early 2020.

(Image: Unsplash/PTI)