THE LEGITIMACY OF REFUSAL TO WORK FACE-TO-FACE BY EMPLOYEES WITH COMORBIDITIES DURING THE PANDEMIC PERIOD

Abstract

The current incidence of the pandemic has demonstrated the need to update work patterns, to maintain the health and preserve the lives of workers who may be affected by Covid-19, and due to age or comorbidity, in this sense, after the return of the work activities and initiation of vaccinations an important issue arises, the right to refuse face-to-face work, by the employee who, having comorbidities, wants to remain in the home office during the pandemic. The objective was to analyze the legitimacy of the right to refuse face-to-face work for employees who have comorbidities. It is an integrative literature review, in databases, SciELO (Scientific Electronic Lirary Online), Academic Google, Legal Journals with delimitation and inclusion of articles in Portuguese and English published from 2019 to 2021. With selection of eleven articles and analysis, I discussed - the right to refuse work by the employee with comobidities and risk of life, as well as the rights of the employer not to accept this condition, as it is the competence of the employer to decide on the working conditions of employees, as it is the employer's business risk. It is concluded that there is no specific legislation that protects the employee from working in home office during the pandemic period, because to make work in these conditions viable, the employer needs to supervise them, structure the employee for telework and home office, this makes -if it is costly to the employer, he may choose not to remain with this employee in his company's staff, which refuses to return to face-to-face service.