Because Of Omicron Variant, Google Extends Work From Home For All Employees

Google's office temporarily has not yet allowed its employees to return to work. (photo credit: pixabay)

JAKARTA – Google has postponed plans to return to the office for its employees in January as the Omicron variant spreads worldwide and nine cases have been detected in the US.

On Thursday, December 2, Google's VP of global security, Chris Rackow, notified workers via email that the company will no longer require them to return to the office on January 10. He also stated that the company will wait until 2022 to determine when their US offices can safely return to be a 'long-term stable work environment.'

This is the fourth delay back to the office for the company, Dailymail.com reported.

In August, Google CEO Sundar Pichai announced that starting in January the company would let countries and locations determine when to end its voluntary work from home policy "based on local conditions, which vary widely across our offices," and promised 30 days head before workers. expected to return to the office.

CNBC also reports that in its most recent email to the company, Rackow said the company has opened 90 percent of its U.S. offices, of which nearly 40 percent of employees have signed in, CNBC.com reports.

Google, headquartered in Mountain View, California, has more than 130,000 employees worldwide.

While Rackow did not mention the Omicron variant as the reason for the delay, this new COVID-19 variant has caused extra precautions after the World Health Organization (WHO) listed it as a 'variant of concern' as scientists sought to determine how it might compare to the Delta variant, in terms of transmission and severity.

Public health experts are still assessing the risk of Omicron, which has several disturbing mutations that suggest the variant can spread quickly and potentially evade immunity from vaccines or previous infections.

The Omicron variant was discovered by South African health officials a few weeks ago, and although not much is known about it, it was recently discovered that the variant is 2.4 times more infectious than the previous variant.

Due to his high number of mutations, he is also believed to be able to avoid vaccines, although most cases are very mild.

Meanwhile, Wall Street banks have not adjusted their plans to return to work for their US offices because of Omicron, but said they were monitoring the situation, Reuters reported.

San Jose State University professor Ahmed Banafa told ABC7 News that Omicron would direct other companies to adjust their return to office goals.

"This will spread to you, most companies know," said Banafa. “The problem is that we are dealing with the unknown. We don't know what will be the next variant."

Netflix stated that they would not be hosting a corporate holiday party but the streaming giant was not holding a company-wide event even before COVID spread.