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Related: Editorials & Other Articles, Issue Forums, Alliance Forums, Region ForumsEvery Single Worker Has Covid at One U.S. Farm on Eve of Harvest
All of the roughly 200 employees on a produce farm in Tennessee tested positive for Covid-19 this month. In New Jersey, more than 50 workers had the virus at a farm in Gloucester County, adding to nearly 60 who fell ill in neighboring Salem County. Almost 170 were reported to get the disease at a tomato and strawberry greenhouse complex in Oneida, New York.
The outbreaks underscore the latest coronavirus threat to Americas food supply: Farm workers are getting sick and spreading the illness just as the U.S. heads into the peak of the summer produce season. In all likelihood, the cases will keep climbing as more than half a million seasonal employees crowd onto buses to move among farms across the country and get housed together in cramped bunkhouse-style dormitories.
The early outbreaks are already starting to draw comparisons to the infections that plunged the U.S. meat industry into crisis over the past few months. Analysts and experts are warning that thousands of farm workers are vulnerable to contracting the disease.
Aside from the most immediate concern -- the grave danger that farmhands face -- the outbreaks could also create labor shortages at the worst possible time. Produce crops such as berries have a short life span, with only a couple of weeks during which they can be harvested. If a farm doesnt have enough workers to collect crops in that window, theyre done for the season and the fruit will rot. A spike in virus cases among workers may mean shortages of some fruits and vegetables at the grocery store, along with higher prices.
https://www.msn.com/en-us/money/companies/every-single-worker-has-covid-at-one-us-farm-on-eve-of-harvest/ar-BB14L8Ww?li=BBnb7Kz&ocid=hplocalnews
DBoon
(22,284 posts)hence a lack of concern by some
Coronavirus does not care about your immigration status. A migrant farm worker has, you can get it
Warpy
(110,900 posts)and starting to realize just who our most essential workers are. Maybe there will be a little more support to get their wages up and get them treated better when they are migrants.
That should be job number one once the Republicans are ousted.
Doremus
(7,261 posts)lostnfound
(16,138 posts)rgbecker
(4,806 posts)and exposing the underbelly of the richest Country in the World! People living in dormitories, being bused around in service to the already wealthy. Old people housed in understaffed facilities called "Nursing homes" and "assisted living apartments". People of color living in over crowded dwellings making the spread of the virus impossible to control. What next? Cops torturing and murdering $20 "forgers" on the street of one of the major cities in the midwest and arresting major news network's reporters without out any evidence of anything while seeking 5 days for evidence of murder while ignoring several video recordings of the act, caught like a hollywood movie, in its naked truth......of course.