- “At the end of quarantine or isolation period, a public officer shall be required to stay away from the duty station for a period of seven days after the date of medical certification,” Kinyua said in a letter to Cabinet secretaries.
Public officers who have been quarantined or isolated because of Covid-19 must obtain clearance from the facility to show they are safe before being allowed to return to work.
This is among the guidelines by the head of public service Joseph Kinyua meant to address Covid-19 stigma and protect affected public officers.
Kinyua said those in quarantine or isolation should notify their immediate supervisors, who will forward the report to his office.
The supervisors must ensure that the civil servants include the date and place of quarantine or isolation in monthly reports to Kinyua. This should be included in the supervisor and the human resource reports to their bosses.
“At the end of quarantine or isolation period, a public officer shall be required to stay away from the duty station for a period of seven days after the date of medical certification,” Kinyua said in a letter to Cabinet secretaries.
The letter dated April 29 is also addressed to the Attorney General, county governments, chairpersons of constitutional commissions, clerks of Parliament, the registrar of the Judiciary, chief executive officers of corporations and clerks of county assemblies.
The head of public service also demanded that the officer provide the relevant documents to their supervisors at the point of returning to work.
“These guidelines shall be applied to public officers returning to work following Covid -19 related quarantine or isolation. The protocol shall be applied in conjunction with guidelines issued to the service by the head of public service, Ministry of Health and other prevailing government policies,” Kinyua said.
He asked the supervisors to ensure co-workers are counselled to enable them to fully support the returning officers.
“At the end of quarantine or isolation period, a public officer shall be required to also comply with the government guidelines on prevention of Covid-19 including wearing of masks, social distancing, maintaining of clean surfaces and wearing of other personal protective gear.”
The supervisors shall arrange to regularly check with the employee during the quarantine and isolation period.
“To the extent practicable, the public officer shall also provide regular updates to the officer. And while making inquiries of the status of the officers, applicable confidentiality requirements governing such situations shall be observed,” Kinyua said.
Kinyua said that the officers returning to work from Covid-19 related quarantine and/or isolation shall not be discriminated or stigmatised.
He said it was an offence to discriminate any person on grounds of actual, perceived or suspected Covid-19 status in the workplace.
“Ministries departments/county governments and agencies are expected to set up pre-work resumption counselling programmes that will instill positive behaviour for the affected officers and provide a conducive environment,” he said.
Edited by P.O