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Google Businesses Medicine

Google Recommends All Employees in Europe, the Middle East, and Africa To Work From Home Because of Coronavirus (businessinsider.com) 62

Posted by msmash from the stepping-up dept.
Google is stepping up its measures against the coronavirus outbreak. From a report: The tech giant will recommend that its workers across the UK, Europe, the Middle East, and Africa work from home starting on Thursday March 12, Business Insider has learned. This comes a week after Google advised US workers in its Washington state and California offices to work from home, as well as those in its 8,000-strong Dublin office in Ireland. Google then widened that to all 11 of its offices in North America. Google has around 100,000 employees in total, most of whom are based in North America. Google has yet to report any confirmed cases of the virus in its US staff, but a worker in its Zurich office tested positive at the end of February. A Dublin worker also reported flu-like symptoms, but tested negative for COVID-19. The tech giant also announced last week that it was suspending in-person job interviews.
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Google Recommends All Employees in Europe, the Middle East, and Africa To Work From Home Because of Coronavirus More

Google Recommends All Employees in Europe, the Middle East, and Africa To Work From Home Because of Coronavirus

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  • Working from home makes sense! Avoid the huge amount of time driving to and from work!

    How can that become the normal way of doing things?

    Obviously, manufacturing will need to become more robotic. Many jobs now require humans to do some work.

    • People barely do any work when at work. They're all on Facebook, Reddit, Imgur, and Slashdot. Now you're asking them to "work" from home. Good luck!

      • Re: (Score:2)

        by AmiMoJo ( 196126 )

        I've been working from home since last year and find I'm super productive. I post on Slashdot and feed the cat and stuff but I also get more work done overall. Fewer distractions, if I have an idea at 7 PM on a Sunday I can go work on it for an hour or two then and there, I control the thermostat and arrange my office the way I like it... The main is I just work the way I work best, not the way the company wants everyone to work.

        The better companies give employees that freedom at work anyway. My current one

  • Has anyone noticed that the response to COVID-19 outbreaks seems to fall on political objectives instead of actual health guidelines? If you're working for Google or going an urban hipster conference like SXSW, you already got shut down. If you're going to a NASCAR event or work for oil company, though... it's business as usual.

    • For all I know there are plenty of other companies also asking people to work from home if possible, but because they aren't tech companies there isn't any coverage of it here. I don't know much about SXSW, but I recall there have been stories about it on Slashdot before, so for all I know it's the same reason. There are a few NASCAR stories, but the last one (at least according to the search on the site) is from 2016 and is about a team paying a ransomware, so it seems the only reason it was talked about w

      • FWIIW, I work for a major enterpirse software vendor and while we haven't sent everyone to wfh globally, it's being done on location by location basis. If an employee is confirmed infected, that office gets closed down at least until it can be disinfected and their contacts traced. Or if there are widescale measures put in place by the local governments like in Italy of course.

        Another reason we hear about tech is that we can actually do it. Nobody really has to leave the house except of some data center guy

    • Re: (Score:1)

      by spun ( 1352 )

      Trump's family business is hotels. COVID-19 is killing the hospitality industry. Trump has Russian mafia payments to make. Trump has the bully pulpit from which to spew his beliefs. Trump supporters don't dare question their overlord.

      You do the math.

    • the red-hats (magats) will keep ignoring this, to their detriment.

      (I could say something, but I'll hold off)

      the really evil part of all this is that one group can affect the other's health, and that's dangerous. its putting others' lives at risk.

      we can't let the redhats do what they want just to 'prove us wrong' because we all live in the same world, breathe the same air, touch the same surfaces.

      this is a time where we cannot just say 'both sides are bad'. when one side acts in a manner that puts the othe

  • Also... WSB TV [wsbtv.com] announced this morning that Google employees in Atlanta should work from home.

    I ride a bicycle to work on days that it isn't raining and rode to work this morning. On a major road this morning, a 2 to 3 mile stretch of US Hwy 23(Buford Hwy), I counted 3 cars. My ride to work [garmin.com] Most mornings there are 200 to 300 cars.

    The mother of my son is not letting him go to school because 2 Atlanta schools are closed because a teacher has tested positive for the virus. All grocery stores are out of t

  • And he's a stable genius.

    • You guys sure are obsessed with Trump.

      • Re: (Score:2)

        by spun ( 1352 )

        You sure are obsessed with getting people to believe this virus isn't a big deal. It's just about all you've written about since you created this account a month ago.

        Who else wants us to believe this virus isn't a big deal? Hmm, who could it be? Maybe someone who owns a lot of hotels and is afraid of losing business, and therefore not being able to pay back the Russian mafia. Know anyone like that?

  • I normally take public transportation to work, but i seen an article where people are starting to question if they should be using it. This was from the U.K. and not U.S. But still, I am supersized that I have not seen more comments/articles about the closed environment of public transportation.

    • Re: (Score:2)

      by MrL0G1C ( 867445 )

      Anecdotal but I heard about a science paper that said one infection was on a bus, the 2 people were 4.5 meters apart, they never went on the same part of the bus and yet one of them supposedly caught the virus from the other meaning that it is very highly airborne. They said they'd ruled out all other possibilities and checked the facts carefully. But I think that still needs confirmation. It would explain though how so many people on a cruise ship caught the virus whilst quarantined - if the virus was trav

      • The government here closed schools and banned all public events over 100 people but still claimed public transport is fine to use.

        I can't see how this can possibly be the case becasue subway or tram cars can easily fit over 100 peope, but even if they're not fully packed, you're still breathing in each others' faces and touching handrails touched by hundreds of others. While it's not something I'm 100% confident in, I've seen some anlyses showing that the virus can remain alive for hours on plastic or metal

        • Re: (Score:2)

          by tlhIngan ( 30335 )

          The government here closed schools and banned all public events over 100 people but still claimed public transport is fine to use.

          I can't see how this can possibly be the case becasue subway or tram cars can easily fit over 100 peope, but even if they're not fully packed, you're still breathing in each others' faces and touching handrails touched by hundreds of others. While it's not something I'm 100% confident in, I've seen some anlyses showing that the virus can remain alive for hours on plastic or metal

  • Relax, Google and Amazon and Microsoft do this all the time!

    Oh wait, no they don't. In fact they've never done it before. They must all be a bunch of pansies, panicking like this over a simple pandemic, huh?

  • Not what I assumed (Score:3)

    by ItsJustAPseudonym ( 1259172 ) on Wednesday March 11, 2020 @03:49PM (#59819362)
    When I read this:

    Google is stepping up its measures against the coronavirus outbreak.

    I figured it meant that Google was going to cutoff the coronavirus from ad revenue. After all, that's their standard procedure.

  • according to our prime minister here in Denmark this evening, they are closing schools and public offices etc and everyone in the country who can work from home should do so, beginning from Monday is their word now.
    Interesting. The truth is that I get more work done from home because I escape from all the chatter and impromptu meetings that people decide to hold in the open office environment. :D

    • The truth is that I get more work done from home because I escape from all the chatter and impromptu meetings that people decide to hold in the open office environment. :D

      This is probably true for a lot of people. I wonder how many people will want to return to the office once the outbreak cools off, after seeing the improvements in productivity and personal well-being. Not to mention the benefits to climate/environment from reduced traffic.

    • Re: (Score:1)

      by AHuxley ( 892839 )
      A bit late for the EU nations math on that idea.
      They had weeks and stayed open to the world. Now the reality of wuflu math sets in.
    • This should be taken in a way that we must avoid visiting a place of large gathering. A work place comes under it as well. The more we stay at home or around a small bunch of people, the better it is for us. All in all, prevention in better than falling ill.

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