Totally paywalled. Unlike many other outlets providing windows on covid-19 through their usual paywalls, WSJ management doesn't give a damn about helping the 99%, nor what the 99% think about them. Unlike their reporters, who try as hard as they can to tell the truth about Real Money.
Coronavirus at meatpacking plants worse than first thought, USA TODAY investigation finds
Coronavirus closed Smithfield and JBS meatpacking plants. Many more are at risk. Operators may have to choose between worker health or meat in stores.
A rash of coronavirus outbreaks at dozens of meatpacking plants across the nation is far more extensive than previously thought, according to an exclusive review of cases by USA TODAY and the Midwest Center for Investigative Reporting.
And it could get worse. More than 150 of America’s largest meat processing plants operate in counties where the rate of coronavirus infection is already among the nation’s highest, based on the media outlets’ analysis of slaughterhouse locations and county-level COVID-19 infection rates.
These facilities represent more than 1 in 3 of the nation’s biggest beef, pork and poultry processing plants. Rates of infection around these plants are higher than those of 75% of other U.S. counties, the analysis found.
The Worthington JBS is among the 153 meat processing plants that USA TODAY and the Midwest Center for Investigative Reporting identified as operating in counties with a high rate of coronavirus infection. Any rate above one infection per 1,000 people puts a county in the top 25% of U.S. counties reporting COVID-19 infection rates.
But USA TODAY won't give us the list. Oh, wait, here we go.
Tracking Covid-19’s impact on meatpacking workers and industry
Using news reports, company press releases, state data and original reporting, we're keeping track of the coronavirus's effect on the meatpacking industry, including positive cases among workers and employee deaths. We'll continue updating through the outbreak.
As of April 28, there have been at least 4,400 reported positive cases tied to meatpacking facilities at 80 plants in 26 states, and at least 18 reported worker deaths at 9 plants in 9 states.
123 entries, so far, like these.
Type |
City |
State |
Company |
Length |
# |
Deaths |
Start Date |
closure |
Columbus Junction |
IA |
Tyson Foods |
two weeks, reopened April 20 |
n/a |
n/a |
4/6/2020 |
closure |
Sioux Falls |
SD |
Smithfield Foods |
indefinitely |
n/a |
n/a |
4/12/2020 |
positive test(s) |
Logansport |
IN |
Tyson Foods |
n/a |
146 |
n/a |
unknown |
worker death |
Camilla |
GA |
Tyson Foods |
n/a |
n/a |
4 |
unknown |
METHODOLOGY: Data that breaks down at what workplace an outbreak occurred is hard to come by. The only state in the above database that includes data on the setting of an outbreak is Colorado. Because of that, we're basing most of our count on numbers that have been reported in news stories. It's also difficult to get exact numbers because some companies, some states and even some unions have refused to release or confirm numbers.
The Courts
Trump Labor Department Says It May Actively Defend Meatpacking Companies Over Workers in Covid-19 Lawsuits
Workers Sue Missouri Meatpacking Plant, Allege Conditions Put Them At Risk For COVID-19 — Harvest Public Media
Court orders meat company to protect workers at Missouri plant
There is a lot more coverage of this MO lawsuit that I don't have room for.
Brief:
UNITED STATES DISTRICT COURT
FOR THE NORTHERN DISTRICT OF CALIFORNIA
SAN FRANCISCO DIVISION
CENTER FOR FOOD SAFETY; FOOD & WATER WATCH, INC.; PETER VAN GORDER; and ROBIN MANGINI; Plaintiffs,
v.
SONNY PERDUE, in his official capacity as the Secretary of the U.S. Department of Agriculture;MINDY BRASHEARS, in her official capacity as the Deputy Under Secretary for Food Safety, U.S. Dept. of Agriculture; U.S. DEPARTMENT OF AGRICULTURE; and FOOD SAFETY AND INSPECTION SERVICE; Defendants.
The plaintiff non-profit organizations, Center for Food Safety (CFS), Food & Water Watch, Inc. (FWW); FWW member Peter Van Gorder; and CFS and FWW member Robin Mangini, (collectively, Plaintiffs) bring this action against the above-listed Defendants (individually and collectively Defendants) for their issuance of new rules that vitiate this country’s food-safety inspection system for swine in slaughter plants, effectively turning it over to the slaughtercompanies themselves. Defendants’ New Swine Inspection System (NSIS) rules also lift prior limits on slaughter-line speeds, allowing plants to move swine carcasses past government inspection-program personnel (hereinafter, inspectors or Program employees) at speeds that neuterthe mandatory government’s critical appraisal of swine carcasses and parts. Defendants approved these dangerous regulatory rollbacks, despite the fact that contaminated pork may cause as many as 1.5 million cases of foodborne illnesses, 7,000 hospitalizations, and 200 deaths in the United States each year.
An older brief:
UNITED STATES DISTRICT COURT FOR THE DISTRICT OF MINNESOTA
CASE 0:19-cv-02660 Document 1 Filed 10/07/19
UNITED FOOD AND COMMERCIAL WORKERS UNION, LOCAL No. 663; UNITED FOOD AND COMMERCIAL WORKERS UNION, LOCAL No. 440; UNITED FOOD AND COMMERCIAL WORKERS UNION, LOCAL No. 2; and UNITED FOOD AND COMMERCIAL WORKERS UNION, AFL-CIO, CLC, Plaintiffs,
v.
UNITED STATES DEPARTMENT OF AGRICULTURE, Defendant.
COMPLAINT FOR DECLARATORY AND INJUNCTIVE RELIEF (Administrative Procedure Act)
Plaintiffs, three local labor unions and their affiliated international labor union that represent workers in swine slaughter and processing plants, bring this action pursuant to the Administrative Procedure Act (APA), 5 U.S.C. §§702 & 706(2), seeking injunctive and declaratory relief with respect to an October 2019rule promulgated by the United States Department of Agriculture’s (USDA) Food Safety Inspection Service (FSIS).
USDA, Final Rule, Modernization of Swine Slaughter Inspection, 84 Fed. Reg. 52300 (Oct. 1, 2019).
The Rule dramatically alters the way in which pigs are slaughtered and processed for human consumption in the United States, abandoning protections for American workers and consumers that have been in place for decades. The Rule entirely eliminates maximum line speeds and reduces the number of government-employed “online” safety inspectors on the lines by forty percent, instead allowing the plants to use their own employees—with no required training—to monitor compliance with health and safety standards.
As thousands of commenters told USDA during the rulemaking process, the Rule will jeopardize the lives and safety of both consumers of pork products and workers like Plaintiffs’ members. Experts told USDA during the rulemaking that “there is no doubt that increasing line speed will increase laceration injuries to workers,” andthe elimination of a maximum line speed will “potentially cause an epidemic of disabling work-related MSDs [musculoskeletal disorders].”
The Chain Never Stops — Mother Jones, 2001
Thousands of meatpacking workers suffer crippling injuries each year. A special report from inside the nation’s slaughterhouses.
In the beginning he had been fresh and strong, and he had gotten a job the first day; but now he was second-hand, a damaged article, so to speak, and they did not want him… they had worn him out, with their speeding-up and their carelessness, and now they had thrown him away!
–Upton Sinclair, The Jungle (1906)
According to the Bureau of Labor Statistics, meatpacking is the nation’s most dangerous occupation. In 1999, more than one-quarter of America’s nearly 150,000 meatpacking workers suffered a job-related injury or illness. The meatpacking industry not only has the highest injury rate, but also has by far the highest rate of serious injury—more than five times the national average, as measured in lost workdays. If you accept the official figures, about 40,000 meatpacking workers are injured on the job every year. But the actual number is most likely higher. The meatpacking industry has a well-documented history of discouraging injury reports, falsifying injury data, and putting injured workers back on the job quickly to minimize the reporting of lost workdays.
There far too many horrors in this article for me to excerpt here.
The titles of these OSHA reports sound more like lurid tabloid headlines than the headings of sober government documents
MSNBC Last Night
Months into coronavirus crisis, federal response has not improved
CDC, OSHA, FDA, all late in issuing guidelines, all refusing to make them mandatory.