NEARLY 500 workers at four food factories in England and Wales have tested positive for Covid-19.
At an Asda-owned meat processing site in West Yorkshire 165 employees contracted the disease after falling ill this month, Kirklees council confirmed yesterday. The site began production again on Tuesday after making “significant adjustments” to allow for social distancing.
The Kober site is the fourth food factory in England and Wales to have found an outbreak of coronavirus among its workers. The number of food factory employees to have tested positive overall in England and Wales now stands at 469.
The other sites with outbreaks were in Wales – 200 coronavirus cases were found at a meat processing plant in Anglesey, 34 cases were linked to Kepak in Merthyr Tydfil and 70 were identified at Rowan Foods in Wrexham.
Health officials will continue to closely monitor clusters of cases at food processing plants after similar outbreaks took place in the US and France. In America it’s understand 25,000 meat and poultry workers are reported to have contracted the virus.
It is thought working conditions and staff spending long period of time in proximity to one another means meat factories are at a heightened risk of spreading coronavirus through human-to-human transmission.
Rachel Spencer-Henshall, director of public health at Kirklees council, said: “I’d like to thank Kober for acting quickly and working with us and Public Health England to help manage this outbreak.
“They reopened their factory on June 23 on a reduced capacity and only colleagues that have been tested and declared fit to return are on site. We’re satisfied with health and safety measures on site which include separation of colleagues on different shifts and as an additional precaution, checking the temperature of colleagues before they enter the site.
“Our advice to residents is to continue to socially distance, wash hands regularly for 20 seconds with soap and water and get tested if they have symptoms. Providing you have not been contacted and told otherwise, you can continue to leave the house following the latest government advice.”
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