Thank you @MattD2 - do you have a reference / link for this information?

If vaccination is expected to reduce the risk of infection, should we also expect reduced risk of reinfection after a person has recovered from COVID? Is there any information available about post-COVID immunity?

It's definitely becoming a burden, especially with all the changes and escalating case numbers - it gets more and more difficult to manage. I am SO over it.

I couldn't agree more - it's so difficult to get clarity and certainty, and there's a lot of responsibility on our shoulders to get this right.

Maybe enquire of Responsible Care NZ or
Simonne Moses, S Moses Consulting
email: simonnemosesatgmaildotcom mobile +64 21 276 6737

Or Linda Haydon - Compliance Manager, Interchem Agencies
Email: lindaatinterchemdotcodotnz Phone: (09) 418-0097 mobile: 021 033 2044

My partner bought us some KN95 masks from the pharmacy. I noted that there were no certifications or markings on the packaging or masks, which he hadn't noticed. After trying without success to find out more about the manufacturer whose details were on the package, he went back to the pharmacy to pick up a prescription and decided to ask the pharmacist about certification. It hadn't occurred to the pharmacist to check certification to the standard......so probably not a genuine KN95.

COVID generally and now Omicron are an amplification of what safety professionals / practitioners have been aiming to do all along with Risk Management methodologies. Organisations that understand risk management principles and have supportive leadership will find it a lot easier to navigate. In organisations where senior managers have low engagement and expect the safety person to do all the heavy lifting will find it a lot more of a struggle.

Like you, I would consider RAT (as well as PCR for that matter) just a monitoring tool, rather than a control.

RAT is only designed to give you information about the hazard so you can take actions, rather than controlling the hazard and preventing infection.

Thanks Steve - I'm sure there will be some valid reasons for wanting to manage the supply, including the inclination of some people to hoard supplies when there are perceived shortages, and the government will want to prioritise critical work activities. But it seems a bit of overreach to impede supply that is sourced independently. What flashes through my mind now is that the government itself is working from a scarcity perspective. :chin:

So even if we can source approved RATs, is the NZ government going to appropriate them?

So what might the implications be of sourcing other brands not currently on the MoH 'approved' list? For example, if we could source brands / types of RATs approved in Australia but not yet on NZ's approved list, would we be likely to be prevented from bringing them in or hindered in using them? Surely 'some' kind of testing would be much better than none at all....??

Is there any way of finding out any information about other brands of RATs that might be in the pipeline already for approval? Our organisation has divisions in Australia that have been able to source RATs that are not currently approved in NZ, and currently it's very difficult to get any of the few approved types, but we are thinking we might be able to organise allocation of RATs that are likely to be approved so we can get them sent to us when approval goes through. Any thoughts on that??

Thank you so much! I have passed this information on to my daughter - she plans to pick up the horse float she bought later today.

Thank you so much - have a great Christmas, and thanks for all the resources and information you share on this forum - great to have such a collaborative spirit!

Thank you for highlighting this important information - my daughter has just purchased a larger vehicle to be able to tow a horse float, but she has never really towed a trailer before. Where would you suggest she could learn more about these important safety considerations (or we can do some research on her behalf and inform her of these important safety points)?

Yes, along with reluctance to carry out their own risk assessment because they don't fully understand it, and / or are not confident to do it themselves, and they are worried about the potential consequences of getting it wrong - yet another reason not to use fear to force compliance because of unintended consequences as byproducts.

Have you done a risk assessment to identify / quantify risks?

The primary transmission pathway has been identified as airborne aerosols from people's respiratory vapours, rather than surface contacts, so I would think that the risk of transmission via contact with the objects themselves would be relatively low, especially if they are not being transferred directly from one person's hands to another. Wouldn't all the other usual protocols be sufficient? i.e., suitable ventilation (natural or mechanical), masks, hand-washing, physical distancing

One of the challenges with SSPs and JSAs is that too many organisations REQUIRE them but then tick the box that the document has been received without ever actually reading it!

In one place I worked, a contractor wanted to go up onto a roof to do a particular task involving an aerial. He tried to beg off the JSA / risk assessment requirement, first trying to argue that he was only going to be up there for a minute or two. Then when I insisted that he complete a risk assessment for specifically what he wanted to do. Then he tried to plead helplessness - this was a longstanding maintenance contractor to the organisation! So I wasn't buying that either. Then the operations manager suggested that the contractor could work with another contractor whose specialty was working at height. So that contractor presented me with a risk assessment, but when I reviewed it, I discovered it included a number of references to tasks that were not relevant to this particular work activity, which I pointed out to him and queried. I was quite astonished at his response - he told me it was good to find someone who actually READ the document!! *smacks palm to forehead in deep dismay!*

I agree with Robert - many organisation are still looking for someone (someone else!) to have overall primary responsibility, rather than considering that every contractor needs to be part of the overall arrangements.

It is quite interesting to look at the history of contractor management in NZ's H&S legislation. In the original HSE Act, there were only employers and employees, so a lot of organisations took the apparent loophole and contracted out for hazardous work. So the HSE Amendment Act attempted to close the gap by stating that employers had to look out for contractors the same as for employees, but what seemed to happen was mainly that each party assumed the other party was responsible, so safety often fell into the gaps.

Then along came HSWA, with nice platitudes with an easy to remember alliteration to make it stick, requiring everyone to "come together and work together nicely". But there isn't a lot of useful information about how that should work in practice, and I think the truth would be that many organisations would struggle to accomplish that degree of communication and collaboration amongst the departments / functions / stakeholders within their own organisations, let alone with external organisations such as contractors.

I think the reality is that in this situation, as with so many other topics, WorkSafe NZ has set an intention of "what" must be accomplished, but without a roadmap to get there, and also without acknowledging the many very human challenges of making that work at an organisational level when so many individuals would still struggle to be in a position to work together in genuinely collaborative ways. And knowing that WorkSafe would be waiting to pounce on any errors only heightens the desire to push the responsibility into someone else's hands.

An analogy I often use when discussing this expectation is to look at many intersections where additional lanes appear just before the intersection and then quickly disappear again on the other side - the intention seems to be to get more vehicles through the intersection on a given traffic light cycle, but then the vehicles are just expected to somehow nicely merge on the other side and go along on their merry way. The reality, however, is that a number of vehicles will use those extra lanes to overtake (or more accurately, to undertake) as many vehicles as possible on the inside (left) before squeezing back into the main lane of traffic, seemingly oblivious that they are cutting off other vehicles and disrupting traffic. Other drivers will resolutely avoid allowing any other vehicles to merge in the space in front of them - not sure whether drivers think it's a competition, or that they somehow miss out on something when another vehicle moves in front of them. But they don't really seem to know how to work together and merge smoothly.

So that is kind of like how this CCC approach seems to go - a good intention that many people either don't understand or don't want to take the time to do, or that they hope someone else will understand it and do it so they don't have to. For this to work, more work is needed.

Remember that "silence implies consent", and "we get exactly the government we deserve, according to our degree of active participation".

We should all be commenting on every consultation and aiming not just to complain about what is currently NOT working, but also to offer constructive suggestions about what would work better.

"The worst they can do is say no, but they can't say yes if you don't ask them." Sometimes we need to keep repeating the message until the time is right and the information gets through.

I strongly recommend that people consider working with a collaborative group to review and comment. I have done this ever since ISO9001:2000 was introduced and the committee of NZOQ decided we would work collaboratively to leverage our combined knowledge, skills and experience to teach ourselves, rather than relying on consultants or courses. It was very effective, and we found the group discussions particularly helpful for gaining an overall better understanding of the framework and its implications.

When the HSNO Act came into law, I approached a colleague from that NZOQ committee and suggested we could do the same with HSNO. From there, our HSNO Working Group was formed, with 4 people at its core. We worked through the initial wave of classifications and controls by working together as a group to review and comment. We sent our collected comments to NZCIC (now Responsible Care NZ), which sent them on to ERMA (now EPA). One of our members was invited to sit on the Technical Liaison Committee, which effectively gave us a seat at the table and a recognised presence for all matters in that domain.

In our case, along with our core of 4 very committed participants, having a well-formed charter from the outset allowed us to align our efforts with agreements about the purpose and scope of our work, as well as how we would work together. Later, as the HSNO framework 'matured', we were able to re-visit, review and update our charter to remain current with our purpose.

When the H&S Reform Bill came along and the MBIE Discussion Document came out, I approached the group to ask if anyone wanted to review the document in similar fashion. One member had retired, but the other two were keen, so we met one evening per week at my dining table to work through the chapters. We discussed and clarified the content, the questions, and our feedback, which allowed us to make a submission on behalf of the group as well as our individual feedback. It was equally important that we all engaged much more deeply with the content and implications, and each person in the group added insights and nuances that the others would have missed if we had tried to do this in isolation.

The remaining members of the group continue to connect and collaborate any time there are significant changes or calls for feedback.

It was very pleasing a few years ago to see WorkSafe and MBIE running World Café style workshops to engage, catalyze discussions and gather a much more comprehensive range of feedback.