By the Seat of Our Pants: the Experience of Small Businesses in the COVID-19 Pandemic, Washington State, March–October 2020

Details

• Journal Article:
  Preventing Chronic Disease (PCD)
• Personal Author:
  Hannon, Peggy A. ; Hammerback, Kristen ; Kava, Christine M. ; Bravo-Acevedo, Perla ; Strait, Michelle ; Harris, Jeffrey R.
• Description:
  Introduction
  
  Most US businesses are small, yet they employ almost half of the nation’s workforce. Literature is limited about how small employers (those with 20–250 employees) have made decisions about operating their businesses during the COVID-19 pandemic. We sought to learn how employers made these decisions, what information sources they used, what information they wanted, and to what extent they worked with or used information from their local health department.
  
  Methods
  
  We conducted qualitative, semi structured interviews with 26 employers in Washington State, from August through October 2020. Employers were recruited from 7 counties (4 urban and 3 rural) that were experiencing either higher or lower COVID-19 case rates than Washington State overall.
  
  Results
  
  Employers relied heavily on national government resources to make decisions about how to operate their businesses during the COVID-19 pandemic. Few employers had relationships with or turned to their local health departments for information or support. Employers wanted information about COVID-19 safety that was specific to their business operations and industry. Employers also described the emotional toll of COVID-19 and the challenge of trying to make high-stakes decisions with rapidly evolving information.
  
  Conclusion
  
  Small employers showed little awareness of their local health departments and the information and assistance they could provide. Local health departments could increase their visibility and build relationships with small employers by partnering with them on value-added services such as workplace health promotion. Establishing these relationships could support more rapid collaboration between local health departments and small employers during future public health crises.
  
  
• Subjects:
  COVID-19 Humans Original Research Pandemics Small Business Washington Workplace
• Source:
  Prev Chronic Dis. 2022; 19
• DOI:
  http://dx.doi.org/10.5888/pcd19.210366
• ISSN:
  1545-1151
• Pubmed ID:
  35324423
• Pubmed Central ID:
  PMC8992682
• Document Type:
  Journal Article
• Funding:
  R01 CA160217/CA/NCI NIH HHSUnited States/ ; U48DP006398/ACL/ACL HHSUnited States/ ; 5R01 CA160217/NH/NIH HHSUnited States/ ; U48 DP006398/DP/NCCDPHP CDC HHSUnited States/
• Volume:
  19
• Collection(s):
  Preventing Chronic Disease
• Main Document Checksum:
  urn:sha-512:6802da029104db1c3341ac8dff05605ef99185718a15cdfe12dc3db15a9d80c3b4b1c43aaea3f240853819965de8e740b0c84ec13720a38dd4b9323fd7e8bb2b
• Download URL:
  https://stacks.cdc.gov/view/cdc/116760/cdc_116760_DS1.pdf
• File Type:
  [PDF - 377.08 KB ]