It’s already hard to find most essential items, if they cut off the supply chain it’s going to be impossible. If the fucking post office and liquor stores are considered “essential” they better sign an executive order forcing these plants to stay open by any means necessary. If every other essential business is managing to continue operations safely they can too.
share Kroger this morning seemed to be fairly well stocked, but the prices for beef were really high. The problem is employees are getting sick and there isn't enough help right now and some plants shut down - the prez just ordered them open under the Defense Production Act and workers will wear protective clothing.
Time will tell - maybe more seafood and veggie menus.
I’m just baffled that the post office and liquor stores manage to stay open but they can’t find a way to keep the plants going
shareAre all the plants shut down, or just the plants where the employees are getting sick??
Because I'm all for temporarily shutting down any office of business where employees are known to be sharing the virus, quarantine everyone who's been in such a place! And in the case of meat plants... well, as long as the questions regarding animal-to-human and human-to-animal transmission remain unanswered, I'm okay with a few more vegetarian meals.
I’m not sure specifically what happened
shareOkay, two seconds of research on google turned up an article about a lot of meat packing plants closing down because employees are getting sick.
https://www.cnn.com/2020/04/08/business/meat-plant-closures-coronavirus/index.html
I am absolutely fine with any workplace where the employees are getting sick closing its doors for a little while, especially if it's an industry that might be affected by something to do with all the unanswered questions about inter-species transmission. Because humans can live without meat if they have to, temporarily or permanently, and most people would rather eat mac and cheese than see employees die, or catch something from employees who don't die.
CNN is the lowest ranked media channel for a reason. This story might be factual, but I can't trust a site that has repeatedly shown to have no journalistic integrity.
shareAccording to various sources the CDC is saying that there's a problem with coronavirus spikes at meatpacking plants, so I'm willing to believe there's a problem.
https://www.upi.com/Health_News/2020/05/01/CDC-Nearly-5000-workers-at-meat-processing-plants-diagnosed-with-COVID-19/9891588347578/
https://www.cnbc.com/2020/05/01/coronavirus-cdc-says-3percent-of-workers-in-surveyed-meat-processing-plants-infected.html
They really ought to temporarily close affected plants and do some serious research, so that hopefully they can keep the same thing from happening at any other plants and keep the industry running with no more than a small hitch. And if this slightly and temporarily reduces the supply of meat, well, there are plenty of other things to eat.
Trump to order meat processing plants to stay open
https://www.cnn.com/2020/04/28/politics/defense-production-act-executive-order-food-supply/index.html
Fuck ya! Been celebrating this the last few hours. He must love steak as much as me.
shareIt means nothing without workers who are home or in the hospital sick.
shareThey’ll send in the national guard in, he invoked the protection act. You can’t cut off the supply chain, that’s more essential than a lot of the bullshit institutions that have been forced to stay open.
shareI'm a vegetarian, therefore I disagree that it's essential. Trump is only upset about not having McDonald's burgers.
shareBad move. There should have been a serious public health investigation into the closed plants, why are the workers there getting sicker than workers in other essential businesses?
Humans can live without meat temporarily, or less meat.
I feel like you talk about meat a lot. Is this irony?
shareI gotta have my meat and potatoes. I can’t feel full unless I have some kind of meat.
shareSame. I'm using part of my stimulus check to stock up on beef from the farm in my town. 100% grass fed with no hormones or antibiotics. I see them on regular basis just hanging out in the fields. I feel horribly bad about the cows at the factory farms. They are treated like shit.
shareLol, I say something similar to my wife. I say "it just isn't a meal unless something died".
shareWell, you are looking for a career change...
shareYou are such an enigma. Most of your posts about covid are that people are stupid because they are out and putting others at risk, and how dare they??
Now you are bitching that you can't get your precious meat, and damn those workers and their families? What gives?
In my province a meat packing plant is responsible 12% of all of our covid cases. But screw them right?
Why are there outbreaks at all of these meat processing plants, but no other factories or institutions? In fact the only other places you see outbreaks like these are prisons and ships. This tells me that the meat processing plants are extremely packed with people and are poorly designed. This will end up being a good thing as an unforeseen problem has shown a flaw in a major artery of our infrastructure, the food chain.
shareYeah, and probably make the price of meat skyrocket.
shareUnfortunately in my area many of the workers at the plant are temporary foreign workers and not only do they have to work closely together, they live in close quarters as well.
We totally take for granted all of the low paid workers that supply our food. If these places paid decent wages (and I'm talking farms as well) to employ non foreign workers then expect to pay for it. I'm sure I've seen you complain about the price of food as well.
That''s not true. Post offices, mass transit (trains and buses), medical clinics and hospitals, courts, nursing homes, planes and houses of worship have large infection rates and/or death rates.
Spain and Italy suffered large infection rates because of the soccer game played between their countries. Italian and Spanish fans spread it among themselves. Funerals and festivals have spread it, too.
i'm a bit late with this answer, but nic christakis just published a twitter thread on this topic that discusses some of the reasons why meat processing plants may be particularly dangerous for virus spreading.
https://twitter.com/NAChristakis/status/1256335412349399041
also note from this article by jon kay in quillette, where he speculates that the ear-destroying sound levels in environments like meat processing plants, where bone saws are a constant background, causes people to have to yell at loud volumes to be heard, resulting in more droplet creation.
https://quillette.com/2020/04/23/covid-19-superspreader-events-in-28-countries-critical-patterns-and-lessons/
Four of the SSEs were outbreaks at meat-processing plants, in which “gut snatchers” and other densely packed workers must communicate with one another amidst the ear-piercing shriek of industrial machinery. I lack the expertise to determine how the refrigerated nature of some meat-processing facilities may affect the dynamics of droplet transmission—though I would also note that at least four of the SSEs on my list unfolded at European ski resorts. But high levels of noise do seem to be a common feature of SSEs, as such environments force conversationalists to speak at extremely close range. (Related factors may be at play in old-age homes. These tend to be quiet places. But the reduced speaking volume and hearing functions of some elderly residents lend themselves to conversations held at much closer range than is socially typical in the general population.)share
I have a terrible fear that the owners of these meat-packing plants will not want to make the plants safer places to work, but will move the entire industry to Mexico or Guatemala, where workers have no rights and nobody bothers them with safety regulations.
sharemistake...
shareEAT FEWER ANIMALS.
shareYes. You don’t need meat every meal. Your heart will thank you. Plus the Meat plant workers are all getting covid. Have you seen the assembly lines at these places? Looks like horrible, grueling work. To subject them to covid too is cruel. I’ll eat disgusting plant burgers for a few months until these meat plants get up to speed on making the work places safe and distanced.
shareWhatever. I have and enjoy vegetarian meals, often.
shareMe too. This and similar discussion have made me realize that I need to eat a lot more vegetarian meals.
Yogurt with nuts and berries for breakfast today, caprese sandwich for lunch, takeout vegetarian Thai for dinner!
Maybe tomorrow it'll be French toast for Sunday breakfast, cherry tomato and roast corn salad for lunch, big bowl of minestrone for dinner, with apple pie after. We'll see what's at the grocery store, good vegetarian receipes are nearly infinite.