Who would have guessed. From today’s email from the University of Oregon, here. Also:
The university has approved a new self-check health regulation which outlines that students and employees should conduct a self-check daily and not come to campus if they are experiencing or have experienced any COVID-19 symptoms in the previous 72 hours. Additional information will be provided about implementation and procedures of this requirement as they are developed.
From what I can see this is about liability – presumably the Ducks can use this to tell their student-athletes that they didn’t fill out the tracking sheet, so they’re on their own:
Self-Check Procedures
Every day before coming on-campus, employees and students should assess whether in the last 72 hours, they have had any of the below symptoms that are different from their baseline:
Stay at home until 72 hours after any/all of the primary COVID symptoms below dissipate without the aid of fever-reducing medications, unless symptoms are within your baseline. Employees should contact their medical provider** and students should contact the University Health Center 541-346-2770 if any of these symptoms are present.
-
- Cough (Employees and students who have a chronic or baseline cough that has worsened or is not well-controlled with medication should stay at their place of residence)
- Shortness of breath
- Difficulty breathing
- Fever (>100 degree F)
- Chills
Stay at home until 24 hours after any/all of the symptoms below dissipate without the aid of fever-reducing medications, unless symptoms are within your baseline:
-
- Loss of smell and/or taste
- Nausea
- Vomiting
- Diarrhea
- Headache
- Runny nose
- Sore throat
- Muscle pain
- Nasal congestion
Campus community members who have other symptoms that are chronic or baseline symptoms are not restricted.
**If you do not have a primary care physician, urgent care or any of Lane County Public Health’s clinics can also be a resource. Benefits eligible employees can also find a primary care physician by reviewing the options available through their UO health insurance plan. Information is available on the Human Resources website. Information about graduate employees’ health insurance is available on the GTFF website.
Recording Procedures
Employees and students do not need to submit their self-symptom-checks to the university but they should record that it was completed in their personal notes or download and print this tracking sheet for personal use so that they can verify that they completed the check upon request.
Tracking sheet – complete twice daily! This sheet was designed for people who’ve been exposed to the virus, I don’t know why UO is suggesting in a mass email that everyone coming to campus complete it. Doesn’t really work for that:
Asymptomatic people, carry on. Nothing to see here.
I haven’t seen or heard much about ventilation and air circulation in campus buildings, though these seem to be critical factors in the spread of the virus. Does anyone know anything?
Another thing: have read horrifying speculation by experts about restrooms and toilets being possible spreaders. Yikes, go into john to wash hands like a good boy, get virus and become a sperspreader!
I wonder what Mr. LeDuc thinks?
The Admin is into magical thinking with how the surge is progressing in Oregon and the county. Cut the bait about P2P this fall and concentrate efforts to assist remote instruction. The from Inside Higher Ed: https://www.insidehighered.com/blogs/just-visiting/lurching-toward-fall-disaster-horizon
The phrase “benefits eligible employees” caught my eye (and not just for the missing hyphen). Are there non-student UO employees who are not eligible for health insurance coverage through the university?
simple answer – you must work at least 0.5 FTE to be eligible
for benefits.
Oh dear. So if you were, say, a career faculty employee with a 0.1 FTE appointment…?
In this particular era, Covid Dawn, call it,
I think benefits would be extended to all employees if
they previously had them. This is what other Universities
are doing – essentially Furlough with benefits.
The university regularly makes grand use of temp employees. UO depends on them, in fact. They get no benefits. They do, however, do the work that should be done by classified staff covered in the CBA. UO often hire temps, so in a way, temp staff are used as a pool of employees to hire from who then have to go through yet another six months of trial work.
Temp employees have a limited amount of time they can do temp work – however, change their job/job title, the clock starts over.
If only this was true for administrators.