California COVID Reporting Requirements: Cal/OSHA Rules and Recordkeeping

For California employers in 2026, COVID reporting requirements have shrunk to a short list: keep your COVID-19 case records under Cal/OSHA’s 8 CCR 3205(j) until February 3, 2026; report any serious COVID-related hospitalization or death to Cal/OSHA within eight hours under 8 CCR 342; check whether the local health department in each of your worksite jurisdictions still has a reporting order on the books; and keep any COVID medical data you still hold under ADA confidentiality protections. The statewide outbreak notification rules, the local health department reporting mandate from CDPH, and the written employee exposure notice under Labor Code 6409.6 are all gone.

What Has Already Expired

California stacked several COVID-19 employer obligations between 2020 and 2024, and nearly all of them have lapsed. Knowing which are gone matters as much as knowing what remains, because employers who keep running defunct notification programs waste resources, and employers who assume everything expired miss the few obligations that did not.

The COVID-19 outbreak standard at 8 CCR 3205.1, which kicked in when three or more cases appeared in an exposed group within 14 days, sunset on February 3, 2025.¹ The broader COVID-19 Prevention standard at 8 CCR 3205 expired on the same date, except for its recordkeeping subsection.²

The statewide requirement that employers report workplace COVID-19 outbreaks to local health departments is no longer in effect either.³ And the written internal employee notification created by AB 685 under Labor Code 6409.6 was repealed effective January 1, 2024. There is no longer a statutory duty to send workers a written exposure notice after learning of a COVID-19 case at the worksite.

Recordkeeping Through February 3, 2026

The one piece of the Cal/OSHA COVID-19 Prevention standard still active in 2026 is the recordkeeping requirement at 8 CCR 3205(j). It requires employers to track and retain records of COVID-19 cases that occurred while the standard was in effect.² Those records should capture the employee’s name, contact information, occupation, worksite location, the date they were last present at the workplace, and the date of a positive test or diagnosis.

This obligation expires February 3, 2026. After that date, no COVID-specific Cal/OSHA recordkeeping mandate remains. Do not destroy the files on day one, though. General Cal/OSHA practice is to retain illness and injury documentation beyond the active life of the underlying rule, and the records may still be relevant to open workers’ compensation claims or litigation. A conservative hold of two to three years past the expiration date is a reasonable default.

Reporting a Serious COVID Illness or Death to Cal/OSHA

One reporting obligation remains fully in force with no expiration: the general duty under 8 CCR 342 to report any serious work-related injury, illness, or death to Cal/OSHA. The rule is not COVID-specific, but it covers severe COVID-19 cases that result in hospitalization or death.⁴

The window is short. “Immediately” under the regulation means as soon as practically possible, and no later than eight hours after the employer knows or reasonably should have known about the incident.⁴ Missing it can trigger significant penalties.

What Counts as a Serious Illness

Under AB 1804, a serious illness means any inpatient hospitalization for treatment, regardless of length, as long as it is not solely for observation or diagnostic testing. It also covers amputation, loss of an eye, or serious permanent disfigurement.⁵ An employee admitted overnight for COVID-related pneumonia treatment triggers the reporting duty even if the stay is under 24 hours.

How to Report

Report by telephone to the nearest Cal/OSHA district office. Under AB 1804, Cal/OSHA is also developing an online reporting mechanism, and until that system is operational employers may report by email. Telephone remains the fastest and most reliable channel, and Cal/OSHA encourages it for all serious incidents.⁵

Local Health Department Orders May Still Apply

The statewide CDPH outbreak reporting mandate has lapsed, but local health departments keep their own authority to require COVID-19 reporting through local orders.³ This is the area most likely to catch employers off guard. A business in Los Angeles County can face reporting duties that a business one county over does not.

Contact the local health department in every jurisdiction where you operate a worksite. The absence of a statewide rule does not mean a local one has not been enacted or renewed, and reporting thresholds, timelines, and content requirements will vary by jurisdiction.

Medical Records You Still Hold

Plenty of California employers collected COVID-19 test results, vaccination records, and screening questionnaires during the pandemic. The emergency-era mandates are gone, but the data in your files is still medical information, and the ADA still governs how you store and share it. Employee medical information must be kept in files separate from general personnel records and accessible only to authorized personnel.⁶

Disclosure is limited to narrow exceptions: supervisors who need to know about work restrictions or accommodations, first aid personnel in emergencies, government officials investigating ADA compliance, and workers’ compensation offices. Moving old COVID test results into a general HR folder, or passing them casually to managers, violates the rule regardless of the age of the records. If you no longer need the data and no retention obligation applies, secure destruction is the safer path.

Whistleblower Protections Still Apply

Employees who raise COVID-19 safety concerns are protected from retaliation under both state and federal law, and those protections do not depend on whether the underlying COVID-specific regulations are still in force. California Labor Code Section 6310 bars retaliation against employees who report workplace safety hazards. Section 11(c) of the federal Occupational Safety and Health Act prohibits firing, demoting, or otherwise punishing workers who raise safety concerns; a worker who believes they have been retaliated against can file a complaint with OSHA, which will investigate and, if it finds merit, attempt a settlement or refer the matter for federal court action.

An employer who disciplines a worker for flagging a current respiratory illness outbreak or an unsafe return-to-work policy still faces exposure under both regimes.

A Short Compliance Checklist

Keep COVID-19 case records under 8 CCR 3205(j) until February 3, 2026, and hold them longer if related workers’ compensation claims or litigation remain open.
Report any COVID-related inpatient hospitalization for treatment, or any COVID-related death, to Cal/OSHA within eight hours under 8 CCR 342.
Contact every local health department where you operate to confirm whether a local COVID-19 reporting order is still in effect.
Keep COVID-19 test results and health screening data in separate, restricted files under ADA confidentiality rules, and securely destroy records you no longer need.
Do not retaliate against workers who raise respiratory illness or workplace safety concerns; Labor Code 6310 and federal Section 11(c) protections remain in force.

1
Department of Industrial Relations. California Code of Regulations Title 8 3205.1 – COVID-19 Outbreaks
2
Legal Information Institute. California Code of Regulations Title 8 3205 – COVID-19 Prevention
3
California Department of Public Health. Workplace Outbreak Employer Guidance
4
Department of Industrial Relations. California Code of Regulations Title 8 Section 342 – Reporting Work-Connected Fatalities and Serious Injuries
5
Department of Industrial Relations. Questions about Changes to the Definitions of Serious Injury and Illness and Reporting to Cal/OSHA
6
U.S. Equal Employment Opportunity Commission. What You Should Know About COVID-19 and the ADA, the Rehabilitation Act, and Other EEO Laws