On August 2, President Biden announced the creation of a national monkeypox response team and two days later declared monkeypox a public health emergency, which can set in motion grant funding and ease the way for additional resources, NPR reports. Days earlier on July 23, the World Health Organization called monkeypox a “public health emergency of international concerns.” The WHO pronounced Covid-19 a global health emergency in January 2020.

The CDC notes that monkeypox has spread across a number of countries that normally don’t report it, including in the U.S., and that the virus is spread mainly via close, intimate contact with someone who already has it. As of August 15, there were 11,890 confirmed monkeypox cases in the U.S., with New York, California and Florida reporting the highest numbers at 2,376, 1,945 and 1,085, respectively.

"We all have a little bit of post-traumatic stress from COVID and what we've just gone through," Dr. Scott Conard, chief medical consultant for the National Alliance of Healthcare Purchaser Coalitions, tells Employee Benefit News. "We're still learning a lot about this. On a scale of one to 10, if one is we know nothing and 10 is we know everything, we're probably at a 3.5 right now."

The good news for employers is that workplaces are not considered to be at-risk locations, unlike clubs, festivals, spas and saunas, where there can be skin to skin contact, Conard says. “Because of the way workers interact, which is non-intimately, monkeypox is not likely to spread at work the way that COVID did,” he says. “If employers have strong COVID policies, that would probably take care of monkeypox, even if monkeypox turned out to be respiratory to some degree or spread through surfaces.”

While it’s still early, employers and human resources teams can learn from their COVID-19 experiences. That can mean adopting a remote or hybrid work plan, implementing indoor masking, social distancing and stricter sanitization protocols for the office if necessarily, Conard says.

In addition to staying on top of information from the CDC, WHO and other sources deemed reputable, employers should remain diligent even if “COVID fatigue” is present among their employees, K&L Gates partners April Boyer and Erinn Rigney write.

“For monkeypox, employers should resurrect (or maintain) some of the original COVID-19 prevention strategies, including by providing disinfectant wipes for employees to clean workstations, and placing alcohol-based hand sanitizer in multiple locations around the workplace,” Boyer and Rigney note.

“As with COVID-19, the most important and effective step in preventing the spread of the virus is to keep sick employees at home,” they add. “While employers can require employees to use paid time off or sick leave, if an employee is ill and has exhausted his or her paid or sick leave, employers should be flexible and implement a discretionary leave policy."

Employers also need to be mind of the stigma associated with monkeypox as there is a higher incidence among men who engage in sexual activity with other men. There also could be a geographic stigma as the disease is typically endemic in some West and Central African countries. This is a good time for employers and employees to review their anti-discrimination and anti-harassment policies.

“Further, employers should not single out employees on the basis of known or suspected sexual orientation in addressing the virus in the workplace as such status is a legally protected characteristic,” they write. “As with COVID-19, employers must ensure that any policies are applied in a nondiscriminatory manner.”

Preparation is key even as monkeypox has not reached the same level of concern as COVID-19, Patrick Dennison, partner at Fisher Phillips, and Aymara Ledezma, associate at the law firm, write for JD Supra.

“An essential lesson employers learned from the COVID-19 pandemic is the importance of developing a written plan to keep employees safe and to show what measures have been taken to keep employees healthy,” Dennison and Ledezma write. “While a comprehensive monkeypox policy may be premature, you should consider developing a written infectious disease policy that can be utilized if faced with an outbreak of monkeypox or any other infectious disease.”