Justice and the autonomous communities set common prevention and security standards for Justice officials during the containment of Covid-19

The establishment of this common standard for the entire territory was agreed at the last meeting of the Crisis Coordination Commission of the Administration of Justice for the fight against the coronavirus, formally constituted last Friday under the order SND / 261/2020 of the Ministry of Health. Said order entrusts the Minister of Justice with coordinating the professional activity of Justice officials, without prejudice to the powers that correspond to the General Council of the Judiciary and the State Attorney General, during the validity of the state of alarm.

Following the recommendations of the health authorities, the resolution published today establishes the following measures:

Precautionary measures

Any protection measure must put collective protection before individual protection. Individual measures must be proportional to the risk of the professional activity.

1. Collective prevention measures:

• Access to the judicial headquarters will not be allowed unless corresponding justification.
• The number of people accessing and the exposure time will be limited to a minimum.
• Hydroalcoholic gels / liquid soaps will be available for the systematic use of those who access the headquarters and the user / prosecutor / detainee with some type of respiratory condition will be provided with a mask.
• A minimum safety distance of 2 meters will be established, both in the entrances and in the public service spaces.
• It will be provided with collective protection elements, such as partitions and security tapes in public service posts, and the cleaning and disinfection activities of the work spaces will be intensified.

2. Work organization measures:

• The use of the telematic means available will be encouraged in order to avoid displacement.
• In the minimum endowments of established essential services, people considered at risk (previous pathologies, pregnancy, lactation or others) will be excluded.
• The unavoidable displacements to health centers, penitentiaries, minors or old people's homes, will be coordinated with the center's management, taking into account the established protection measures.
• The transfers of detainees and prisoners to the judicial headquarters will be limited as far as possible, arbitrating the videoconference system or any other that allows bidirectional communication of sound and image.
• Signs or citations will be temporarily distanced, as far as possible, to avoid the accumulation of people in the judicial offices.

3. Non-exhaustive individual protection measures:

• Protective measures aimed at controlling and reducing virus transmission will be strictly followed. In case of suffering respiratory conditions, they must notify the health authorities and follow their instructions.
• Personal hygiene measures will be reinforced in all work areas and against any exposure scenario: take care of hand hygiene to avoid accidental contacts with secretions or surfaces contaminated with them, cover your mouth and nose with a disposable tissue when coughing , or do it at the internal angle of the elbow, avoid contact with the eyes, nose and mouth and the use of decorations. The safety distance of two meters will be maintained with people who show signs of respiratory affection and sharing objects will be avoided.
• Masks and gloves will be enabled for essential services personnel for urgent departures for the necessary purposes.

4. Measures on the physical work environment:

• Informative posters will be placed in workplaces with the safety instructions to be observed, as well as in public areas and customer service areas. Also in the toilets, with information on how to wash your hands.
• Special attention will be paid to hygiene in the environment, improving cleaning and disinfection, especially in areas of confluence and common use. Ventilation work will also be intensified.

Protocol for positive and / or isolation cases

• On the part of the affected: they must follow the instructions of the health service of their autonomous community, communicate the situation of temporary disability through the territorial management or equivalent body of a transferred community and transfer their situation to their hierarchical superiors and closest work environment .
• On the part of the hierarchical superior of the affected worker: he must communicate the positive and, where appropriate, the temporary incapacity to the territorial management or equivalent body and adopt the organizational decisions to guarantee the provision of essential services. The situation will be communicated urgently to the staff of the organ or office of the respective worker so that they can adopt the appropriate precautionary measures.
• On the part of the territorial management or equivalent body of the transferred autonomous community: instructions will be given to cleaning companies on disinfection measures. The health authorities will be informed of the positive for the adoption of the appropriate measures and the Health resolutions regarding the orders for closure, cessation of activity or isolation will be communicated.

Activities and risk of exposure

• Occupational exposures are considered those occupational situations in which close contact with a confirmed case of symptomatic Covid-19 infection can occur.
• Close contact is considered to be any worker who provides care to a symptomatic probable or confirmed case or who is in the same place and a distance less than 2 meters from a symptomatic probable or confirmed case.
• Low-risk exposures are considered to be work situations in which the relationship that can be had with a probable case or with a confirmed case does not include close contact.
• People who do not have direct attention to the public or, if they do, occur more than two meters away or with collective protection measures that avoid contact, are considered low probability of exposure.

These recommendations must be brought to the attention of the respective occupational risk prevention services and the Health and Safety Committees for information and transfer.

Civil Registry hours extension

On the other hand, the Minister of Justice, in consensus with the autonomous administrations of the Crisis Coordination Commission and in consultation with the CGPJ and the State Attorney General's Office, has issued a second resolution whereby civil registries will be available to all days of the week, in the usual hours of the morning and between 17:00 and 20:00 in the afternoon, for the provision of the essential services of registration of deaths and issuance of burial licenses during the validity of the state of alarm.

The measure seeks to give maximum respect to those who die from Covid-19, to alleviate the feeling of helplessness of their relatives, who have not been able to say goodbye to them, and to avoid the desolation caused by the accumulation of deaths among health personnel.

With these same objectives, the Ministry of Health, as delegated authority by virtue of the declaration of the state of alarm, left article 24 of the Civil Registry Law suspended last Saturday – which requires a period of 24 hours between death and burial – so that families can arrange in the shortest possible time what they deem appropriate for the funeral of their loved ones.