Why Meatpacking Plants Have Become Covid-19 Hot Spots

[Yo_Mama_Been_Loggin]

IN TEXAS, THE fastest growing Covid-19 outbreak isn’t in Dallas or Houston or San Antonio, the state’s most densely packed metro areas. It’s hundreds of miles to the north, in the dusty, windswept flatlands of Moore County, population 20,000. According to data reported Monday by the state health department, 19 out of 1,000 residents in Moore County have so far tested positive for the novel coronavirus that causes Covid-19—10 times higher than the infection rates in the state’s largest cities.

So what’s in Moore County that’s making people so sick? One of the nation’s largest beef processing facilities, where huge armies of employees slice, shave, and clean up to 5,000 cattle carcasses a day. Last month, Texas health officials launched an investigation into a cluster of Covid-19 cases linked to the massive meatpacking plant, which is operated by JBS USA, a subsidiary of the largest meat processing company in the world, based in São Paulo, Brazil.

But Moore County isn’t an outlier. In recent weeks, beef, pork, and poultry processing plants across the US have emerged as dangerous new hot spots for the deadly respiratory disease, which can also cause damage to the heart, kidneys, and brain. Dozens of plants have been forced to temporarily halt operations amid skyrocketing numbers of cases and fatalities. According to a report released Friday by the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention, nearly 5,000 plant workers in 19 states had tested positive for the virus as of April 27. In Iowa and South Dakota, close to a fifth of the workforce in the states’ largest slaughterhouses have fallen ill.

And it’s not just the US. Large Covid-19 clusters have also appeared in meatpacking plants around the world, including Canada, Spain, Ireland, Brazil, and Australia. “One, two, or three meatpacking plants—fine, you might expect that. But these outbreaks are clearly a worldwide phenomenon,” says Nicholas Christakis, head of the Human Nature Lab at Yale where he studies how contagions travel through social networks. “To me, that’s evidence that there’s something distinctive about meatpacking that’s adding to people’s risks of catching Covid-19.”

https://www.wired.com/story/why-meatpacking-plants-have-become-covid-19-hot-spots/?utm_source=nl&utm_brand=wired&utm_mailing=WIR_Science_050720&utm_campaign=aud-dev&utm_medium=email&utm_term=WIR_Science&bxid=5be9f8cb24c17c6adf0e5d24&cndid=25394153&esrc=bounceX&source=EDT_WIR_NEWSLETTER_0_SCIENCE_ZZ

[captain queeg]

1. The area outside the plant is deep with shit. Blood and other fluids leak.

Seems like a good breeding ground even if it’s kept clean on the inside. Los of hot water and steam in the air. But probably just that they are manned heavily by poor brown people.

[Marrah_Goodman]

2. It's because the employees work shoulder to shoulder

And protective equipment wasn't thought of until it was too late.