Google asks its North America employees to work from home to prevent the spread of Coronavirus

In an effort to make sure that its employees in North America don’t get infected with the Coronavirus disease(COVID-19), Google is recommending the employees to work from home through April 10.  Google’s vice president of global security, Chris Rackow wrote an email to all of North America employees saying, “Out of an abundance of caution, and for the protection of Alphabet and the broader community, we now recommend the you work from home if your role allows.”

This is not the first time that the company is issuing such guidelines to prevent the spread of Coronavirus. Employees in other regions, including Europe are given similar guidelines a few days back. The search giant already canceled its annual developer conference over Coronavirus concerns.

Chris Rackow’s email also says the company is “carefully monitoring the situation and will update the timeline as necessary.”

Google is in the process of establishing a fund for COVID-19 that will make it easier for all the temporary staff across the globe to take paid sick leave if they develop symptoms of the COVID-19, or unable to work because they’re quarantined.

“Google is establishing a COVID-19 fund that will enable all our temporary staff and vendors, globally, to take paid sick leave if they have potential symptoms of COVID-19, or can’t come into work because they’re quarantined,” the company said. “This fund will mean that members of our extended workforce will be compensated for their normal working hours if they can’t come into work for these reasons.”

Source: CNET