Australian Department of Health web site that deals with the COVID-19 outbreak. Provides daily statistics, recommendations and advice.

Dr. Jim Kennedy provides a detailed checklist of items that organizations need to consider to sense-check existing pandemic plans, or to inform planning processes which may be underway.

Planning

• Develop or revise your crisis management plan so that considerations about a pandemic are immediately made.
• Develop a plan for an alternative workforce in the event that a large portion of the usual workforce is impacted by a pandemic. Estimates are for potential absenteeism rates are high and could range from 10 to 25 percent, with larger rates in metropolitan areas.
• Plan on taking special precautions to assess the health of the workforce and potentially plan to turn back infected workers who report for work.
• Plan on how to deal with the emotional impact of such events as death and potential of death on the individual’s family as well as the workforce in general.
• Companies should plan for reduced production or service delivery based on reductions of customer demand, labour force, raw material supply or energy resources needed for operations.
• Companies should entertain plans to work cooperatively with other companies to maintain critical business services and ventures in the event that this is necessary.
• Develop contingency plans for raw material and supply stockpiling as these resources may be impacted by a pandemic, especially those that are imported or rely on imported raw materials for their production.

Policy revision

Immediately consider changes to policies that:

• Define absenteeism. (Continuity Matters Addition: Particularly in the context where parents are forced to stay home to look after school aged children that normally attend a school that has been shut down.)
• (Continuity Matters Addition– Address payments to casual or contract staff that are unable to work because of instructions from Governments or their employer.)
• Encourage teleworking or telecommuting.
• Define travel by staff (attempt to use teleconference and videoconferencing wherever possible) (Continuity Matters Addition: Will your organisation require staff to isolate if they returned from holidays?)
• Allow flexible work hours and alternate workplaces.

Use of technology

Consider:

• Use of tele or videoconferencing instead of face-to-face meetings.
• Increasing capacity of remote access facilities.
• Increasing trunk capacity of telephone systems to accommodate increase use of teleconferencing and telephone meetings. Increasing the capacity of Internet connectivity.
• Improved information security protection due to increased technology use.
• Increased use of VoIP or cellular phones to allow for management, sales and service colleagues to be accessible wherever they are located.

Workforce (changing the way you do business)

• Develop and deliver internal communications instructing the workforce on dealing with proper reactions to a pandemic.
• Hospitals and healthcare facilities will be severely overwhelmed and probably have insufficient resources to treat patient load, the company should be prepared to offer internal medical assistance to its workers or others in the event of a pandemic. This includes stocking of face masks and anti-bacterial and anti-viral hand washing liquids in restrooms.
• Review insurance coverage specifically reviewing coverage in regard to the impact of a pandemic on business operations and employee health.
• In the event of food, medicine, and other shortages company should be prepared to provide aid to both to employees and to customers.
• Identify and train back-up staff for key positions in the event that key personnel are impacted by a pandemic.
• Consider in-house day care facilities.

Raw material supply

• Plan on the assumption that shortages will take place.
• Make sure that if raw materials are unavailable for some reason related to a pandemic, there are sufficient surge capacities to allow for continued production.
• Make sure that alternative sources are identified for critical domestic and imported raw materials?
• Make sure that adequate maintenance and repair supplies are obtained, as lead times to acquire such materials could be severely impacted by the pandemic.

Transportation services

• A pandemic will cause restrictions in the movement of raw materials and products, or shortages of fuel may occur; make sure, therefore, that contingency plans are in place to provide adequate movement of product to sustain business operations.
• Make sure that waste management systems are designed for surge capacities in the event that movement and processing of wastes is disrupted.
• Plan for alternate transportation sources.
• Plan for providing transportation for critical workers to and from work locations.

Communications

• Prepare for and communicate the communication channels that the company will utilize to keep employees, customers, and suppliers informed as to company activities during the pandemic.
• Develop pre-planned media statements for use when needed.
• Have contingency statements prepared for delivery to the workforce. 
• Early communications should be made to suppliers and customers to set expectations. 
• Alternate communications channels need to be developed in case normal communication channels become unreliable or overloaded.

Customers

• Anticipate what customers will expect in terms of product or service demand, and delivery during the pandemic.
• Determine what product or services are likely to be impacted the greatest by the pandemic.
• Develop a prioritization for product and service delivery for customers if production or service delivery is adversely impacted.
• Communicate any changes to lead times for notification to the customer if the capability to provide the goods or services significantly reduces.

Go to the Continuity Central website

Here's a curated list of suggestions to help with COVID-19 messaging in your organisation.

For employers:

• On a daily basis, clean surfaces that people touch.
• Provide ample supply of alcohol wipes and hand sanitisers in the office.
• If your office receives visitors, find a way to inquire whether they have possibly been exposed to COVID-19.
• Provide access to a Help Line for staff that are feeling anxious or want to report feeling unwell.
• Assure contractors and casual staff that they will be paid normally if they work from home (you don’t want them to turn up to work sick because they cannot afford the loss of income).
• The World Health Organisation has produced a very useful document for the workplace: https://www.who.int/docs/default-source/coronaviruse/getting-workplace-ready-for-covid-19.pdf?sfvrsn=359a81e7_6
• This is a useful Australian site: https://virologydownunder.com/so-you-think-youve-about-to-be-in-a-pandemic/

Instruct staff:

• To not touch their face with their hands.
• Wash their hands regularly and aggressively with soap and cold water.
• To avoid physical contact.
• To clean any shared desks, phones, keyboard and mouse with alcohol wipes.
• If you have been informed that you have been around someone who may have been infected, inform your manager Staff should stay home if they feel unwell.
• If they have flu-like symptoms, they should get tested for COVID-19 and report to their manager if they test positive.

For Travellers:

• Check SmartTraveller prior to travel, regardless of whether it is for business or personal travel – countries listed as DO NOT TRAVEL may impact your insurance.
• Employer to clearly identify which countries are subject to travel bans.
• Some staff may feel uncomfortable travelling anywhere overseas.
• Inform your Manager if you intend to travel for personal reasons.
• Travellers returning from overseas, may have to self-isolate on their return.

Here are some posters from WHO and others that can be printed and used around the office.

The handshake alternative

How to cough and sneeze

Hand washing best practice

Hand rubbing best practice

Reuters reported that the communique issued at the end of the meetings in the oil-rich Gulf state would be the first to include references to climate change since the foundation in 1999 of the group of 19 leading industrial nations and the EU.

Key findings:

Rapid spread of the coronavirus will weaken China’s growth sharply in the short-term, causing global disruption. While there were signs in early 2020 that the worst was over for world trade and manufacturing, that optimism has been dashed by the outbreak.

In China, we expect the near-term impact to see Q1 growth plunge to just 3.8% y/y. Although growth should then rebound, it will take time for the loss in activity to be fully recovered and we have cut our 2020 China growth forecast by 0.6pp to just 5.4%.

Global conditions should strengthen in H2 as the disruption fades. But we now project 2020 global growth will slow to just 2.3%, its weakest since 2009.

Read the full report here

"It really is death by a thousand cuts,” said John Evans, managing director of Tractus Asia, a company that has 20 years’ experience helping firms move to China, but which over the past two has had more enquiries from businesses looking to leave. “This is a black swan event and I don’t think we’ve seen anything like it in recent history, in terms of the economic and supply chain impact in China and across the globe.”

In October 2019, Dr. Janet Woodcock, the director of the FDA’s Center for Drug Evaluation and Research, testified before Congress that the United States “has become a world leader in drug discovery and development, but is no longer in the forefront of drug manufacturing.” 72% of API manufacturing takes place outside the U.S., and the use of foreign-sourced materials “creates vulnerabilities in the U.S. supply chain,” Woodcock concluded.