A worker from Seaboard Triumph Foods’ Sioux City, Iowa, pork plant has died from COVID-19.
According to a report from the Sioux City Journal, the worker was a 56-year-old man; he is the first Seaboard Triumph Foods worker to die from the virus, and the fourth Sioux City meatpacking worker overall.
Seaboard’s Sioux City plant is the seventh largest fresh pork plant in the world, with 2,400 workers and a daily slaughter capacity of 20,400 hogs. According to the Sioux City Journal, Iowa’s Woodbury County, which contains the plant, has recorded nearly 1,300 COVID-19 cases.
Public Radio Tulsa reported there is also an outbreak of COVID-19 at the Seaboard pork processing plant in Guymon, Okla., where at least 116 employees have tested positive. In Oklahoma’s Texas County, which contains the plant, there are 236 confirmed COVID-19 cases, but it is not clear how the county-wide infections correspond with that of the plant, according to the report. As of now, the plant remains open.
Miller Poultry in Steuben County, Ind., canceled its shifts on Monday after testing all 1,000 employees for COVID-19 on Friday and Saturday. According to WTVB, there were six positive tests last week among Miller Poultry employees, and one positive tests for a USDA inspector. Miller Poultry told Meatingplace the plant reopened on Tuesday.
State officials have confirmed that five employees of Stampede Meat Inc. in Santa Teresa, N.M., have tested positive for COVID-19. According to KFOX14, the New Mexico Department of Health has conducted multiple tests of Stampede employees.
In Brazil, JBS has received authorization from a labor court to reopen a poultry plant in Passo Fundo, Rio Grande do Sul, on Thursday; the plant was ordered closed on April 24 after 19 workers tested positive for COVID-19. According to Reuters, the authorization came with two wrinkles: first, all JBS employees who reside in Passo Fundo must be placed on leave for 14 days; and second, Priscila Schvarcz, the state prosecutor, told Reuters she will appeal the decision to stop the plant’s reopening.
In Canada, Alberta’s COVID-19 problems continue. Harmony Beef in Balzac, which is just north of Calgary, has now had 34 coronavirus cases, according to a report from CBC. The plant remains open, but the president of Agriculture Union – a large plant inspector union – has called for it to be shut down.
Plants in Alberta operated by Cargill and JBS have also seen COVID-19 outbreaks; Cargill’s High River plant, which saw one worker death and nearly 1,000 infections, reopened Monday after closing April 20.
(This story has been updated to show that Miller Poultry reopened its Steuben County, Ind., plant on Tuesday.)
To access Meatingplace‘s ongoing coverage of the COVID-19 pandemic, click here. To access our map of processing plants that have reported positive tests among employees, have closed and/or have reopened, click here.