{"id":52758,"date":"2020-04-25T07:24:28","date_gmt":"2020-04-25T12:24:28","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/olduvai.ca\/?p=52758"},"modified":"2020-04-25T07:24:34","modified_gmt":"2020-04-25T12:24:34","slug":"ignoring-us-alarms-alberta-meat-packers-spawned-canadas-biggest-outbreak","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/olduvai.ca\/?p=52758","title":{"rendered":"Ignoring US Alarms, Alberta Meat Packers Spawned Canada\u2019s Biggest Outbreak"},"content":{"rendered":"\n<h3 class=\"wp-block-heading\"><a href=\"https:\/\/thetyee.ca\/News\/2020\/04\/24\/Alberta-Meat-Packers-COVID-Outbreak\/\">Ignoring US Alarms, Alberta Meat Packers Spawned Canada\u2019s Biggest Outbreak<\/a><\/h3>\n\n\n\n<p class=\"wp-block-paragraph\"><strong>As the virus gripped US plants, the union pleaded for a shutdown. They were rebuffed.<\/strong><\/p>\n\n\n\n<figure class=\"wp-block-image\"><img decoding=\"async\" src=\"https:\/\/thetyee.ca\/News\/2020\/04\/24\/CargillMeatPackingPlant.jpg\" alt=\"CargillMeatPackingPlant.jpg\"\/><figcaption>Cargill\u2019s High River, Alta. meat-packing plant, shut down due to a deadly outbreak weeks after its union pleaded for a temporary closure and safer working conditions.<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n\n\n\n<p class=\"wp-block-paragraph\">Canada\u2019s largest outbreak of COVID-19 swept through two meat-packing plants in southern Alberta two weeks after the provincial government ignored union requests to temporarily close both of the plants.<a href=\"https:\/\/thetyee.ca\/News\/2020\/04\/24\/Alberta-Meat-Packers-COVID-Outbreak\/#series-listview-link\"><\/a><\/p>\n\n\n\n<p class=\"wp-block-paragraph\">And it mirrored a series of recent, well-documented hot-zone eruptions in meat plants in the United States.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p class=\"wp-block-paragraph\">More than 600 immigrant workers and community members have been infected while the disease has killed at least three people at Cargill\u2019s High River plant and the JBS food plant in Brooks, Alta.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p class=\"wp-block-paragraph\">\u201cThe real issue here is a moral issue,\u201d charged Thomas Hesse, president of the United Food and Commercial Workers Local 401, which represents workers at the plants. \u201cHow do we as a society want to bring food to our tables?\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p class=\"wp-block-paragraph\">Rachel Notley, the former premier of Alberta, has called for a full public inquiry.<a href=\"http:\/\/support.thetyee.ca\/\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noreferrer noopener\">The&nbsp;Tyee&nbsp;is&nbsp;supported by&nbsp;readers&nbsp;like&nbsp;you&nbsp;Join us and grow independent&nbsp;media in&nbsp;Canada<\/a><\/p>\n\n\n\n<p class=\"wp-block-paragraph\">\u201cIt is unconscionable that we now have a situation where hundreds of people have contracted a deadly virus,\u201d&nbsp;<a href=\"https:\/\/calgary.ctvnews.ca\/ndp-accuses-province-of-grossly-mismanaging-covid-19-outbreak-at-cargill-plant-1.4906079\">said<\/a>&nbsp;Notley, who leads the NDP Official Opposition. \u201cWhat kind of concerns put the lives of workers so low?\u201d she asked on CBC Radio yesterday.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p class=\"wp-block-paragraph\">Alberta\u2019s growing outbreaks follow in the wake of deadly events in the U.S. where meat-packing plants have become COVID-19 incubators.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p class=\"wp-block-paragraph\">The U.S.&nbsp;<a href=\"https:\/\/www.bbc.com\/news\/world-us-canada-52311877\">recorded<\/a>&nbsp;its largest single cluster of cases at a pork-processing facility in Sioux Falls, South Dakota in early April. By the time the Chinese-owned facility closed for two weeks there were nearly 900 cases.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p class=\"wp-block-paragraph\">\u2026click on the above link to read the rest of the article\u2026<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>Ignoring US Alarms, Alberta Meat Packers Spawned Canada\u2019s Biggest Outbreak As the virus gripped US plants, the union pleaded for a shutdown. They were rebuffed. Canada\u2019s largest outbreak of COVID-19 swept through two meat-packing plants in southern Alberta two weeks after the provincial government ignored union requests to temporarily close both of the plants. And [&hellip;]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_monsterinsights_skip_tracking":false,"_monsterinsights_sitenote_active":false,"_monsterinsights_sitenote_note":"","_monsterinsights_sitenote_category":0,"footnotes":""},"categories":[2,4],"tags":[5549,103,12145,29011,319,29535,23884,855],"class_list":["post-52758","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-economics","category-environment","tag-andrew-nikiforuk","tag-canada","tag-cargill","tag-covid-19","tag-food","tag-meat-packing-plant","tag-thetyee-ca","tag-viral-pandemic"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/olduvai.ca\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/52758","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/olduvai.ca\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/olduvai.ca\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/olduvai.ca\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/olduvai.ca\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=52758"}],"version-history":[{"count":2,"href":"https:\/\/olduvai.ca\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/52758\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":52760,"href":"https:\/\/olduvai.ca\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/52758\/revisions\/52760"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/olduvai.ca\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=52758"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/olduvai.ca\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=52758"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/olduvai.ca\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=52758"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}