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Comment by anonymous1457 | Hacker News Reader

Googler working in Zurich here.

FWIW all Google Zurich leads and my whole management chain insisted that people having any kind of symptom (in general, and not just for the Coronavirus) should rest at home & see the doctor to recover and prevent infecting other Googlers.

They also insisted that even "healthy Googlers" feeling insecure coming to work can fully work from home in the coming weeks, and told managers that they shouldn't prevent their managees from doing so.

This company has just always been super comprehensive regarding health conditions. If you don't feel good and just want to go back home to rest or take a 2h nap in the sleeping room you can just do it without any justification. Whenever I discuss this with friends none of them has the same freedom and trust that Google gives us.

Wishing the best to everyone in this scary period.

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Can confirm -- also a Googler, but from Austin and recently Mountain View. This is both Google's default policy (not feeling well? go home) and recommendations for current conditions, with more emphasis on staying home even if you're uncomfortable. We even have a whole team dedicated to tracking this stuff and keeping Googlers safe.

It's amazing how much outright hate is being spewed here over this -- it borderlines on outright panic.

> This is both Google's default policy (not feeling well? go home)

I can’t imagine many tech companies (or even salaried office jobs) having very different default policies.

That is sort of missing the point in an emerging pandemic.

Google's not my first rodeo, and I can say that many many tech companies I have worked at have unstated policies of "work until you drop" because of the startup culture that pervades tech. Google is not one of those.

Just bear in mind, what you see from the news media is not rarely the whole picture -- especially when the veil of corporate secrecy is involved.

He undermines Google in every post. Par for the course.

You won't get Google's culture. Regardless of the HN bubble it really is employee friendly and it shows in crises like these. Our health insurance is also the best if not way better than other FAANG + Microsoft. When the travel ban happened Google security helped people across the globe. Not many tech companies would do that. Doubt Amazon would.

> Doubt Amazon would.

yikes

https://www.theguardian.com/technology/2017/jan/31/amazon-ex...

Bezos fighting Trump. No history there. Also did Amazon send it's own security to help employees stuck in other countries ? I'm sure they would have charged people for help.

How is Google's work-from-home policy nowadays? Does it differ between Europe and the US?

It all depends between you and your manager. But as long as you're productive and are not always WFH, I have seen no issues with people taking days to WFH. Some specialists and proven architects negotiated to WFH full time.

https://www.cdc.gov/coronavirus/2019-ncov/about/symptoms.htm...

Symptoms should not be what causes people to stay home or not

If someone has symptoms, they could have been infecting others for up to 14 days prior

There's fairly little evidence that COVID spreads from unsymptomatic carriers. They may, but not significantly.

Yalemedicine isn't the CDC, but not a bad data point?

https://www.yalemedicine.org/conditions/covid-19/

>The CDC believes SARS-CoV-2 is contagious during the incubation period, which is believed to be 14 days, and symptoms of COVID-19 can appear anytime between two and 14 days after exposure. It has identified the following symptoms

From elsewhere:

> It may be possible that a person can get COVID-19 by touching a surface or object that has the virus on it and then touching their own mouth, nose, or possibly their eyes, but this is not thought to be the main way the virus spreads.

This doesn't mean asymptomatic people can't spread the disease, but that the likelyhood of spread from asymptomatic carriers is lower (which makes a lot of sense).

[0]: https://www.cdc.gov/coronavirus/2019-ncov/about/transmission...

from your CDC link

>Can someone spread the virus without being sick? 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.

So to be clear, people CAN spread the virus before they are noticeably symptomatic, even if they are not at PEAK virulence.

This completely misses the point.

If people are exposed, they DO NOT KNOW they are sick. There are no symptoms for the first few days even though you're shedding virus.

You are most contagious just prior to symptoms

The point of closing spaces is to force people who FEEL FINE from spreading the virus further.

>You are most contagious just prior to symptoms

Do you have a reputable source for that? The WHO, CDC, and EU state that asymptomatic transmission is minor if it happens at all

Yes, the most recent episode of TWIV, dedicated to Coronavirus.

The onus is on employees to "feel insecure" and take extended work-from-home time, instead of being the default position that one can opt out of.

In practice, that means most don't exercise that option and those who do for any real length of time take a career hit (unknowingly).

Actually I'm going to work the whole next week at home and most of my team mates will do the same even though we don't really feel unsafe at work compared to anywhere else.

Given the current situation I'd say that you probably have more chances to contract the virus when taking public transport or going to public spots/events than I have at work :-)

Statistically speaking, that's probably not quite true.

It's hard to say without more details, but I suspect there are more people in that office that are infected.

Are they decontaminating the office? How many emps are there in the Zurich office?

This isn't the US, this is Europe where employees have rights such as sick days, and they use them, so somebody having an absence from the office due to health reasons is pretty common - certainly not special in any sense to get a career hit out of it.

I think this comment is far more newsworthy than the original article

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