Updates and Clarifications Regarding Vulnerable Workers

Subject: Updates and Clarifications Regarding Vulnerable Workers, Mandatory Quarantine with Active Monitoring, Voluntary Home Quarantine with Active Monitoring, and Special Leave for Working Parents

Updates on this matter are provided below, based on regulatory developments and in light of recent clarifications from INPS.

1) The protections afforded to employees in the private and public sectors who are in particularly vulnerable circumstances

Article 26 of Decree No. 18/2020 (the so-called “Cura Italia” decree) provides that individuals with a recognized severe disability (Article 3, paragraph 3, of Law No. 104/1992) or who are at risk due to immunosuppression, the effects of cancer or the administration of related life-saving therapies, duly certified by a disability designation (Article 3, paragraph 1, of Law No. 104/1992), the entire period of absence shall be treated as equivalent to a hospital stay upon presentation of a medical certificate.

In the absence of the disability certification referred to in Article 3, paragraph 1, of Law No. 104/1992, the condition of risk may also be certified by the medical-legal bodies operating within the local health authorities with territorial jurisdiction. This protection has been granted to workers considered vulnerable for periods of absence from work between March 17, 2020, and October 15, 2020. An amendment to Decree No. 104/2020 (the so-called August Decree), inserted during the process of converting the text into law, modified the aforementioned Article 26 regarding vulnerable workers, providing for these categories of workers, effective from October 16, 2020, through December 31, 2020, the standard performance of work in a remote work format, including “through assignment to a different position within the same category or job classification, as defined by the

“current collective bargaining agreements, or the provision of specific vocational training, including remotely.”

Law No. 178/2020 (the so-called 2021 Budget Law) extended the protections provided for vulnerable workers for the period from January 1, 2021, to February 28, 2021, reaffirming that work is generally to be performed remotely, including through assignment to a different position within the same category or job classification, as defined by applicable collective bargaining agreements, or through the completion of specific professional training activities, including remotely. The treatment of documented absences by workers considered “vulnerable” as equivalent to hospitalization applies in all cases to those workers who cannot work remotely, not even through reassignment to a different position within the same category or job classification. The individuals concerned are all employees in the public and private sectors who are in a vulnerable condition, excluding those enrolled in the Separate Pension Scheme.

2) Changes effective January 1, 2021, for workers in quarantine under active surveillance or under self-quarantine

With regard to private-sector workers in general who are placed under quarantine with active monitoring or under home confinement with active monitoring, for the purposes of INPS recognition of sick leave, the Budget Law has

effective January 1, 2021, the requirement for the attending physician to include on the medical certificate “the details of the order that led to the quarantine with active monitoring or to home isolation with active monitoring” has been eliminated,

previously scheduled for 2020.

3) Special leave for employed parents

Article 22-bis of Decree-Law No. 137/2020 (the so-called “Ristori Decree”), which was incorporated when the decree was converted into law, provided (for employed parents) for paid leave to be used to abstain from work during the period of suspension of in-person instruction, limited solely to second- and third-year classes in lower secondary schools located in so-called “red zones.”

A similar leave provision has been established, throughout the country, for parents of children with disabilities in situations of verified severity (e.g., Art. 4, Law No. 104/1992), during the period of suspension of in-person instruction in schools of all levels, for which the suspension of in-person instruction has been ordered, or who are enrolled in day care centers for which closure has been ordered by a measure adopted at the national, local, or individual school level.

To receive this benefit, you must submit a specific online application to INPS; this application may also cover periods of leave taken prior to the date of submission, provided that such periods do not predate November 9, 2020.

Special leave is available only to parents who are employees.

Self-employed parents and parents enrolled in the separate pension scheme are therefore excluded.

The leave may be taken by one parent or both, but never simultaneously during the same days when in-person activities are suspended; the parent does not need to live with the child.

In any case, the leave may be taken only if it is not possible to work remotely.

Duration of leave and amount of compensation

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