COVID-19 rampant at meat plants. Trump and Tyson Foods must help workers | Editorial

If workers at meat packing plants like Tyson Fresh Meats near Pasco are considered essential, then they should have all the protection they can get.

If social distancing means the production line is slowed, then so be it. Employee health must matter more than profits.

However, President Donald Trump this week signed an executive order that classifies meat processors as “critical infrastructure,” which gives the federal government significant leverage in determining whether a meat plant should close.

The powerful meat industry pushed for the directive, and the mandate appears to emphasize food production and the bottom line over protecting workers from the new coronavirus.

According to The New York Times, one of the main points of the “critical infrastructure” designation is that meat companies now will be better protected in court if lawsuits are filed by employees who contracted the coronavirus at work.

What Trump’s order should do is ensure that meat processors are no longer a hotbed for disease.

Around the county the coronavirus has rampaged through meat packing plants, where many employees work only elbows apart.

Estimates by the United Food and Commercial Workers (UFCW) show 22 meat plants around the country have closed at some point during the past two months because of the outbreak.

Tyson Fresh Meats in Wallula shut down on April 25 so workers could be tested for COVID-19. The decision unfortunately came after one worker died from the illness. It is a shame more steps were not taken earlier to prevent the disease from spreading so quickly at the plant.

As of this writing, at least 144 workers have tested positive for the disease.

With 1,236 test results released by Saturday, the percentage of positive test results at the plant is just under 12 percent, meaning one in eight workers have been infected. These include residents of Benton, Franklin and Walla Walla counties, and one in Umatilla County, Ore.

The outbreak at the Wallula beef plant has endangered the entire Tri-City region. Testing for 1,400 workers already has begun, and in the first round, 56 out of 400 workers tested positive for the coronavirus. That’s an infection rate of 14%.

Sen. Patty Murray, D-Wash., blasted Tyson Foods for not closing the Wallula beef plant earlier. She said the company knew there were 34 cases of COVID-19 on April 13, but did not announce a temporary closure until April 23.

Tyson Foods is still considering when to reopen the plant after it closed for testing. Part of the decision is dependent on having enough healthy employees ready to go back to work.

When it reopens, the plant will need to adhere to the COVID-19 safety measures outlined by the Walla Walla County Department of Community Health.

Those include screening for COVID-19 symptoms, temperature checks, social distancing, placement of plexiglass dividers between work stations and communication about the disease that all workers can understand, including those who speak little English.

The social distancing requirement is key.

UCFW officials want processing plants to spread workers farther away from each other even if that slows down production. Apparently, the U.S. Department of Agriculture granted waivers to some meat plants earlier this month so they could speed up the assembly line, even though that forced employees to work closer together.

Those waivers need to go.

The UCFW also wants the White House and the USDA to ensure all meatpacking and food processing workers have masks and gloves and whatever other protective wear they need.

John Tyson, chairman of the board for Tyson Foods Inc., took out a full-page ad in several newspapers in the nation announcing that, “the food supply is breaking” and that the company has a responsibility to feed the country.

He also said the “safety of our team members will remain our top priority.”

It had better be.

Before the Wallula plant shut down, a petition was started urging its closure. The number of signatures is over 5,500, and that means people are paying attention.

Trump’s order says meat plants are critical to the country because they provide food. An industry with such an important responsibility should treat its workers better.

This story was originally published May 1, 2020 at 12:20 PM with the headline "COVID-19 rampant at meat plants. Trump and Tyson Foods must help workers | Editorial."