Guymon, Oklahoma, is part of the coronavirus’ new frontier: mostly rural communities with meatpacking plants where employees work inches apart, carpool to their jobs and live in crowded homes. About a quarter of the SeaboardFoods workforce is infected
A worker at a hog processing plant eats behind plexiglass screens installed in the facility's cafeteria to try to contain the spread of the coronavirus disease within the plant, in Guymon, Oklahoma, U.S., May 13, 2020. Picture taken May 13, 2020. Seaboard Foods Inc./Handout via REUTERS
Guymon is part of the coronavirus’ new frontier - mostly rural communities with large meatpacking plants where employees often work inches apart, carpool to their jobs and live in crowded or multi-generational homes. “I think we brought the virus home to him,” said Pilar Jimenez, 53, who lived with both Anthony and Felix.
Duke Sand, chief executive officer of Seaboard Foods, told Reuters the company is adhering to U.S. Centers for Disease Control and Prevention guidance on how to contain the virus at the plant, including timetables on when affected employees should return to work and what safety equipment, such as screens and masks, to give them.
Opinions about the dangers of the virus do not necessarily fall along neat or predictable lines, interviews with about two dozen local residents show. Although the population is small, Guymon and Texas County are demographically and politically complex. Support for the company seems to run hot and cold depending on feedback from a friend or a brother-in-law. Several workers expressed fear of going to work but fear, in equal measure, of losing their jobs if they complained.For now, Seaboard confirmed, its employees appear to account for roughly half of Texas County’s COVID-19 cases. The numbers are in flux: Not every employee has been tested and the county’s confirmed caseload is steadily rising with expanded testing.
Although the precise mortality rate for the coronavirus is not known, medical experts say they believe it exceeds 1%, more than 10 times the rate for the flu. Reuters was not able to independently confirm allegations of pressure to return to work. Seaboard CEO Sand said the company is advising workers to follow CDC guidance: Allowing at least 10 days to elapse since symptoms such as fever first appeared, and at least three days since they resolved.
Although Seaboard never shut its plants, about 30 facilities operated by other companies temporarily closed in Nebraska, Iowa, Minnesota and several other Midwestern states, according to the UFCW. Pork and beef slaughter capacity dropped by 30% to 40%, according to the U.S. Department of Agriculture.
By mid-May, when the company offered mass testing, sickness and fear had pushed absentee rates as high as 30%, and daily slaughter fell from the normal 22,000 hogs per day to as low as 10,000 some days, according to plant General Manager Rick Sappington.Seaboard agreed to a union proposal for paid sick leave to motivate workers to report symptoms and self-quarantine at home, Rosas said.
He grew gravely ill mid-flight and the pilot turned around. Felix died where the helicopter landed, in the parking lot of the Kansas hospital.
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