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We have taken — and will continue to take — all necessary precautionary measures... as we prioritize everyone’s health and safety ... Google’s Zurich office w

We have taken — and will continue to take — all necessary precautionary measures... as we prioritize everyone’s health and safety ... Google’s Zurich office will remain open So they've taken all necessary precautions except the one that would actually prioritize health and safety by asking all employees in that office (or at least those on the same floor/seating area as the infected employee) to work from home and self-isolate. I thought the germ theory of disease was already well accepted and we had a pretty good idea of how pandemics spread.

claudeganon 7y ago
Butts in seats for non-critical work is going to be the downfall on all of this. It's very shortsighted to do things like ban mass gatherings, but risk people's health by insisting on hundreds of people in close quarters to tweak display ads or whatever.
SpicyLemonZest 7y ago
We do have a pretty good idea of how pandemics spread, and one of the major vectors is people who must remain isolated failing to isolate themselves. Telling people to self-isolate in response to every small risk doesn't prioritize health on net, because it encourages people not to treat self-isolation as a serious thing.
- deleted 7y ago
  [deleted]
- ajsnigrutin 7y ago
  That's why you isolate everyone. We (smaller company, also in eu, with infections in neighboring countries already) have a plan to just work from home, when first cases appear here. It's not 100% potection of course, but just reducing contact between people.. especially 8h/day in offices, where people sneeze, cough, eat, pick their noses, etc, helps.
koheripbal 7y ago
They aren't even telling employees which group or floor the employee was in, so employees cannot even gauge their risk level. Imagine going home to your family without knowing if you've been exposed to a disease that has a ~2% mortality rate. ...and then the company asks everyone to come back into work the next day. Google's response here is shocking.
- neuronic 7y ago
  For Google's predominant age group the mortality is more in the realms of 0.2%.
  - guruz 7y ago
    And that age group does not have social contact to people over 50?!
  - Bishop_ 7y ago
    Some of these employees may have young children or elderly parents whom they could infect.
  - cnst 7y ago
    Do Google employees not have friends, relatives, parents and grandparents?
  - Johnny555 7y ago
    But even 30 year olds have friends and family that are in high-risk categories. Do you really want to risk bringing home a disease that puts grandma at a 10% risk of dying?
  - deleted 7y ago
    [deleted]
  - davidw 7y ago
    One of the first people to get it in Italy was a healthy 38 year old man. He had to be put on a respirator for a few days, although he's doing better now. It's serious, even for younger people, and that's if health care infrastructure doesn't get overwhelmed.
kmonsen 7y ago
You are cutting important parts of the statement, the individual was not in the office after showing symptoms and current research shows that it is very unlikely to transmit the virus before showing symptoms.
- jtbayly 7y ago
  Source?
  - Aunche 7y ago
    https://www.cdc.gov/coronavirus/2019-ncov/about/transmission.. https://www.cdc.gov/coronavirus/2019-ncov/about/transmission.... Some spread might be possible before people show symptoms; there have been reports of this occurring with this new coronavirus, but this is not thought to be the main way the virus spreads.
    - jtbayly 7y ago
      page not found. Presumably this one? https://www.cdc.gov/coronavirus/2019-ncov/about/transmission.html https://www.cdc.gov/coronavirus/2019-ncov/about/transmission... It's worth noting that this document does not make any claim that it cannot spread prior to symptoms. It says this: " - People are thought to be most contagious when they are most symptomatic (the sickest). - Some spread might be possible before people show symptoms; there have been reports of this occurring with this new coronavirus, but this is not thought to be the main way the virus spreads."
      - kmonsen 7y ago
        Note, I did also not say it was impossible but very unlikely. Perhaps that is too strong, but it what I was told.
- vlastik 7y ago
  Please do not spread unverified claims.
- deleted 7y ago
bitL 7y ago
Dude, science is only important when it makes money, not when it prevents one from making money ;-)
jsnell 7y ago
Presumably there's a spectrum for the closeness and duration of contact, which determines who gets tested / isolated / etc. Let's say that somebody travels back from Italy, and stops by the office for 5 minutes on the way home, to pick up something. The people at the office are going to be about as exposed as the people who were at the airport that day. I presume we don't try to track down or isolate everyone at that airport? (To go a bit further, as far as I can tell, in none of the Swiss cases is there any kind of information that would let the public reason about whether they could have been exposed. E.g. about which trams or trains the people with an infection took.) While if somebody spent a full day coughing at the office, went to the cafeteria for lunch and dinner, had a few meetings, etc. Well... Seems like you'd want to isolate a lot of people. And that's not a decision the company gets to make, it'd be done for them by the authorities, and a lot of people would know. If no details of any sort have been released to employees, it kind of suggests this case was at the first end of the spectrum.
- Johnny555 7y ago
  Seems like you'd want to isolate a lot of people. And that's not a decision the company gets to make, it'd be done for them by the authorities, and a lot of people would know. Why not? Why can't Google say "Out of an abundance of caution, we're closing the office for 2 weeks and asking employees to work from home. We recommend, but do not require, that employees take steps to self-isolate themselves and monitor themselves for symptoms." I understand that authorities could force companies to close offices, but I don't understand why a company couldn't make the decision to do so on their own. If no details of any sort have been released to employees, it kind of suggests this case was at the first end of the spectrum. I don't see how it suggests anything at all?
  - jsnell 7y ago
    > Why not? Your question seems to have nothing to do with what you quoted. The context for that was the case where, given what we know about the transmission parameters of the virus, it was plausible that the employee had infected others. And in that case, of course the company has no choice in the matter. Those people get isolated, no matter what. What you seem to want to discuss is a totally different case. One where the authorities don't think there's sufficient risk to isolate anyone, but the company shuts down the office anyway. Correct? Surely there's some kind of a threshold that comes into play in that case. There must be scenarios where transmission is so unlikely that you think there's no point in shutting down the office. One in thousand? One in a million? One in a trillion?
ocdtrekkie 7y ago
The weird thing here is I imagine the number of people who can't do their job effectively from home at a Google office is super low. Asking people to stay home likely wouldn't even significantly impact business.
- lastres0rt 7y ago
  The Google employees that do their work over VPN can probably work from home. Foodservice, janitors, and security, OTOH...
  - ocdtrekkie 7y ago
    True, though if you close the office and let people work from home who can do their work from home, you also don't actually need the work from food service, janitors, security, etc. You just lock the doors and tell them to stay home. (I'd say in this case Google should still ensure those people get paid, though I guess that's not a guarantee considering how they treat TVCs.)
  - midev 7y ago
    Google doesn't even use VPN's. It's wonderful: https://thenewstack.io/beyondcorp-google-ditched-virtual-private-networking-internal-applications/ https://thenewstack.io/beyondcorp-google-ditched-virtual-pri...
  - mnm1 7y ago
    > Foodservice, janitors, and security, OTOH... All completely unnecessary jobs when no one is in the office.
whateveracct 7y ago
> So they've taken all necessary precautions except the one that would actually prioritize health and safety by asking all employees in that office (or at least those on the same floor/seating area as the infected employee) to work from home and self-isolate. You need butts in seats to know you're getting your money's worth.
- cnst 7y ago
  /sarcasm?
  - whateveracct 7y ago
    Hm either sarcasm or putting myself in a BigCo middle manager mindset?
baddox 7y ago
Given that there is always some risk of infectious disease, and working from home would probably always reduce that risk, what is the risk level threshold above which it's appropriate to close an office?
downerending 7y ago
> I thought the germ theory of disease was already well accepted It's Google, so they might need to reinvent their own (no doubt better) theory.
timwaagh 7y ago
my employer/client (Dutch government) is taking the same approach. I don't like it, especially because they are the government. They should be a little bit more paranoid about these things.
juped 7y ago
The germ theory of disease is just a theory, while butts-in-seats management is a fact.

claudeganon 7y ago

Butts in seats for non-critical work is going to be the downfall on all of this. It's very shortsighted to do things like ban mass gatherings, but risk people's health by insisting on hundreds of people in close quarters to tweak display ads or whatever.

SpicyLemonZest 7y ago

We do have a pretty good idea of how pandemics spread, and one of the major vectors is people who must remain isolated failing to isolate themselves. Telling people to self-isolate in response to every small risk doesn't prioritize health on net, because it encourages people not to treat self-isolation as a serious thing.

deleted 7y ago
[deleted]
ajsnigrutin 7y ago
That's why you isolate everyone. We (smaller company, also in eu, with infections in neighboring countries already) have a plan to just work from home, when first cases appear here. It's not 100% potection of course, but just reducing contact between people.. especially 8h/day in offices, where people sneeze, cough, eat, pick their noses, etc, helps.

koheripbal 7y ago

They aren't even telling employees which group or floor the employee was in, so employees cannot even gauge their risk level. Imagine going home to your family without knowing if you've been exposed to a disease that has a ~2% mortality rate. ...and then the company asks everyone to come back into work the next day. Google's response here is shocking.

neuronic 7y ago
For Google's predominant age group the mortality is more in the realms of 0.2%.
- guruz 7y ago
  And that age group does not have social contact to people over 50?!
- Bishop_ 7y ago
  Some of these employees may have young children or elderly parents whom they could infect.
- cnst 7y ago
  Do Google employees not have friends, relatives, parents and grandparents?
- Johnny555 7y ago
  But even 30 year olds have friends and family that are in high-risk categories. Do you really want to risk bringing home a disease that puts grandma at a 10% risk of dying?
- deleted 7y ago
  [deleted]
- davidw 7y ago
  One of the first people to get it in Italy was a healthy 38 year old man. He had to be put on a respirator for a few days, although he's doing better now. It's serious, even for younger people, and that's if health care infrastructure doesn't get overwhelmed.

kmonsen 7y ago

You are cutting important parts of the statement, the individual was not in the office after showing symptoms and current research shows that it is very unlikely to transmit the virus before showing symptoms.

jtbayly 7y ago
Source?
- Aunche 7y ago
  https://www.cdc.gov/coronavirus/2019-ncov/about/transmission.. https://www.cdc.gov/coronavirus/2019-ncov/about/transmission.... Some spread might be possible before people show symptoms; there have been reports of this occurring with this new coronavirus, but this is not thought to be the main way the virus spreads.
  - jtbayly 7y ago
    page not found. Presumably this one? https://www.cdc.gov/coronavirus/2019-ncov/about/transmission.html https://www.cdc.gov/coronavirus/2019-ncov/about/transmission... It's worth noting that this document does not make any claim that it cannot spread prior to symptoms. It says this: " - People are thought to be most contagious when they are most symptomatic (the sickest). - Some spread might be possible before people show symptoms; there have been reports of this occurring with this new coronavirus, but this is not thought to be the main way the virus spreads."
    - kmonsen 7y ago
      Note, I did also not say it was impossible but very unlikely. Perhaps that is too strong, but it what I was told.
vlastik 7y ago
Please do not spread unverified claims.
deleted 7y ago

bitL 7y ago

Dude, science is only important when it makes money, not when it prevents one from making money ;-)

jsnell 7y ago

Presumably there's a spectrum for the closeness and duration of contact, which determines who gets tested / isolated / etc. Let's say that somebody travels back from Italy, and stops by the office for 5 minutes on the way home, to pick up something. The people at the office are going to be about as exposed as the people who were at the airport that day. I presume we don't try to track down or isolate everyone at that airport? (To go a bit further, as far as I can tell, in none of the Swiss cases is there any kind of information that would let the public reason about whether they could have been exposed. E.g. about which trams or trains the people with an infection took.) While if somebody spent a full day coughing at the office, went to the cafeteria for lunch and dinner, had a few meetings, etc. Well... Seems like you'd want to isolate a lot of people. And that's not a decision the company gets to make, it'd be done for them by the authorities, and a lot of people would know. If no details of any sort have been released to employees, it kind of suggests this case was at the first end of the spectrum.

Johnny555 7y ago
Seems like you'd want to isolate a lot of people. And that's not a decision the company gets to make, it'd be done for them by the authorities, and a lot of people would know. Why not? Why can't Google say "Out of an abundance of caution, we're closing the office for 2 weeks and asking employees to work from home. We recommend, but do not require, that employees take steps to self-isolate themselves and monitor themselves for symptoms." I understand that authorities could force companies to close offices, but I don't understand why a company couldn't make the decision to do so on their own. If no details of any sort have been released to employees, it kind of suggests this case was at the first end of the spectrum. I don't see how it suggests anything at all?
- jsnell 7y ago
  > Why not? Your question seems to have nothing to do with what you quoted. The context for that was the case where, given what we know about the transmission parameters of the virus, it was plausible that the employee had infected others. And in that case, of course the company has no choice in the matter. Those people get isolated, no matter what. What you seem to want to discuss is a totally different case. One where the authorities don't think there's sufficient risk to isolate anyone, but the company shuts down the office anyway. Correct? Surely there's some kind of a threshold that comes into play in that case. There must be scenarios where transmission is so unlikely that you think there's no point in shutting down the office. One in thousand? One in a million? One in a trillion?

ocdtrekkie 7y ago

The weird thing here is I imagine the number of people who can't do their job effectively from home at a Google office is super low. Asking people to stay home likely wouldn't even significantly impact business.

lastres0rt 7y ago
The Google employees that do their work over VPN can probably work from home. Foodservice, janitors, and security, OTOH...
- ocdtrekkie 7y ago
  True, though if you close the office and let people work from home who can do their work from home, you also don't actually need the work from food service, janitors, security, etc. You just lock the doors and tell them to stay home. (I'd say in this case Google should still ensure those people get paid, though I guess that's not a guarantee considering how they treat TVCs.)
- midev 7y ago
  Google doesn't even use VPN's. It's wonderful: https://thenewstack.io/beyondcorp-google-ditched-virtual-private-networking-internal-applications/ https://thenewstack.io/beyondcorp-google-ditched-virtual-pri...
- mnm1 7y ago
  > Foodservice, janitors, and security, OTOH... All completely unnecessary jobs when no one is in the office.

whateveracct 7y ago

> So they've taken all necessary precautions except the one that would actually prioritize health and safety by asking all employees in that office (or at least those on the same floor/seating area as the infected employee) to work from home and self-isolate. You need butts in seats to know you're getting your money's worth.

cnst 7y ago
/sarcasm?
- whateveracct 7y ago
  Hm either sarcasm or putting myself in a BigCo middle manager mindset?

baddox 7y ago

Given that there is always some risk of infectious disease, and working from home would probably always reduce that risk, what is the risk level threshold above which it's appropriate to close an office?

downerending 7y ago

> I thought the germ theory of disease was already well accepted It's Google, so they might need to reinvent their own (no doubt better) theory.

timwaagh 7y ago

my employer/client (Dutch government) is taking the same approach. I don't like it, especially because they are the government. They should be a little bit more paranoid about these things.

juped 7y ago

The germ theory of disease is just a theory, while butts-in-seats management is a fact.