Coronavirus: How signage and labelling are vital to an anti-coronavirus workplace

Quality signs and labels can play a seminal role in an effective anti-coronavirus (COVID-19) strategy during these difficult times for thousands of UAE businesses.

Employers have become accustomed to managing illness such as flu and colds in the workplace, particularly in the long winter months.

However, the unprecedented coronavirus outbreak is causing many to urgently revisit their workplace policies and practices to ensure continued worker health and safety.

And this includes the use of signs and labels as part of an effective plan.

Health and Safety law says employers must take sensible steps to protect workers and that includes adopting reasonable precautions by following Public Health UAE guidance for your sector.

Workplace Care

But the workplace is among the most risky environments for people at the current time.

Despite more and more of us opting to work from home, the sheer volume of people required to carry out key responsibilities and tasks under one roof in hospitals, healthcare facilities, warehouses and other essential facilities focuses the mind more than ever on the paramount importance of hygiene to reduce risks and limit the spread of contagion.

For some companies, safety can slip under the constant pressure to create a more efficient, better service for customers.

But under UAE law, employers must observe a duty of care to their workforce: they must identify the health and safety risks each person faces at work.

Signs and Labels Practices

In these difficult times, good use of signs and labels can be deployed to protect, advise and inform in the workplace, helping to keep people safer and healthier.

Properly located and suitably deployed, cautionary signs and labels, for example, can be among the first line of physical defence in the battle to alert people to the dangers and amplify public health messages in high-population places such as:

• Warehouses
• Fulfilment centres
• Call centres
• Commercial offices 
• Retail outlets 

It’s important to recognise that each workplace is different with its own unique set of risks, but the early adoption of comparatively simple measures can not only be relatively inexpensive but highly effective in mitigating risk.

Your Signs and Labels Strategy Will Minimise Risk

Clearly, it’s going to be difficult for everyone to comprehensively mitigate against the coronavirus threat in the weeks and months ahead, but a sound strategy can help to minimise the risks.

It’s also important to tailor your decision-making to meet your specific needs – the one-size fits all approach won’t always work in an environment where the balance between productivity and people’s health and well-being is paramount.

Think about your requirements in terms of quality, reliability and performance, and consider also how your supplier can add value in helping you understand the role that signs and labels play in securing a safer tomorrow.

If you’d like to receive your personalized energy and cost savings assessment, please contact the experts at Loc8 (Loc8- 800 Loc8 5628).