NEW MEXICO (KRQE) – Under the current public health order if you travel out of state, you must quarantine for 14 days once you get back. However, there are some exceptions.

“We are now reapplying the 14-day mandatory quarantine for all out of state visitors. If you’re flying here, you’re quarantined, you wanna drive here for vacationing? You’re quarantined in your room,” said Governor Michelle Lujan Grisham at a press conference in early July.

When Gov. Lujan Grisham first announced the new travel quarantine less than a month ago, the vast majority of the general public knew they could not leave New Mexico without going into quarantine. Under the order, there are certain people who don’t have to hunker down.

Among them, airline employees, those performing public safety functions, emergency first responders, health care workers, military personnel, federal employees, anyone arriving under a court order, like out-of-state witnesses and those who have to travel for essential business.

News 13 spoke with La Montanita Co-op Wednesday whose employees sometimes travel for essential business. They say they’ve completely halted out-of-state travel for now, despite the exemption.

“Just for safety sake, we’re trying to find a workaround. So for example, from Colorado right about now we’re getting peaches and normally we would drive up there with our trucks, but instead, we’re relying on third-party distribution services to bring that to us so we don’t have to expose ourselves, our team members,” said JR Riegel with the La Montanita Co-op Food Market.

News 13 also spoke with both Presbyterian and the University of New Mexico Hospital Wednesday about their health care workers. They released the following statements:

Presbyterian follows current New Mexico Department of Health (NMDOH) guidelines regarding travel and health care workers.   If a Presbyterian health care worker travels from outside New Mexico, they must contact Human Resources for an evaluation before entering or returning to the workforce per NMDOH’s guidelines.

Presbyterian Healthcare Services

University of New Mexico Health follows New Mexico Department of Health guidelines when it comes to travel and health care workers. If an employee travels from out of state, the employee must be screened and cleared by UNM’s Employee Occupational Health Services prior to entering the workforce.

UNM Health

The Department of Health does want to be very clear that any out of state travelers that are exempt from quarantine, still have to wear a mask and abide by social distancing guidelines.