Two Eastern PA Facilities Rocked by COVID-19

Two Pennsylvania food processing facilities rocked by COVID-19. Cargill's facility in Hazleton and JBS facility in Souderton, PA both closed after numerous cases.

Philadelphia Inquirer
https://www.inquirer.com/business/meat-plants-pennsylvania-cargill-jbs-souderton-covid-20200409.html
Hazleton meat-packaging plant closes with 130 workers testing positive for COVID-19. Union leader at Souderton plant died last Friday.
by Bob Fernandez, Updated: April 9, 2020- 5:07 PM

Cargill Meat Solutions, a 900-worker plant in Hazleton, Pa., that packages meat in plastic for supermarket shelves in Pennsylvania and surrounding states, shut down temporarily on Tuesday as 130 hourly workers have tested positive for COVID-19 and a rash of employees called out sick, a union leader said.

And on Wednesday, the Philadelphia Medical Examiner’s Office confirmed to the family of a 70-year-old union steward at the JBS Beef slaughterhouse in Souderton, now shut down for a second week for sanitizing, that he died on April 3 from respiratory failure brought on by the pandemic virus.

More - https://www.inquirer.com/business/meat-plants-pennsylvania-cargill-jbs-souderton-covid-20200409.html

"Meat-processing plants across several states — Colorado, Iowa, and Nebraska along with Pennsylvania — are reporting COVID-19 outbreaks. A federal food inspector in New York died from the disease last month. And at least four meat plants in Pennsylvania have recently closed due to concerns related to the pandemic, said Wendell Young IV, president of the 35,000-member United Food and Commercial Workers Local 1776, which represents workers at all four plants."