Another employee of the American poultry company Foster Farms died of complications due to COVID-19 over the weekend, making him the 12th employee of the California-based corporation who died after contracting the coronavirus.
According to the Los Angeles Times, the worker’s family told the employee: who was of Punjabi descent and in his fifties, worked at the Foster Farms plant on Cheres Avenue in Fresno, California.
After being diagnosed with COVID-19, the man spent the last three weeks in the intensive care unit of a local hospital before dying, according to Deep Singh, executive director of the Jakara Movement, a non-profit organization young and family from Central Valley working with the Punjabi Sikh Community.
Singh told the Times that the worker’s family believes he contracted the virus at work as he avoided going outside the house other than going to the plant or for other essential reasons.
The man is the third Fresno plant worker to die of COVID-19, with nine additional coronavirus fatalities related to Foster Farms’ Livingston, California plant.
According to Foster Farms, at least 193 people at the Fresno plant have tested positive for COVID-19, about 20% of its workers.
Singh said the poultry company should have done more to protect its staff, accusing the company of “insensitive concern and protections that prioritize the safety of workers and their families.”
The company has also received criticism for poorly communicating with its employees, for giving directions in English, although many of the company’s employees have limited command of the language.
Foster Farms had previously been monitored to deal with the pandemic, and community leaders told the Times that the company has asked its employees to work overtime in the midst of the pandemic.
Days before Christmas, a Merced County judge granted a temporary restraining order sought by the United Farm Workers of America union against Foster Farms.
The order required Foster Farms to supply masks to workers at its Livingston plant and required workers to wear them when social distancing was not possible. The Associated Press reported.
The order also required the company to conduct temperature and health tests for workers and visitors before entering the plant, as well as physical separators in break rooms and along production lines.
In response to the most recent death, Foster Farms said in a statement to The Hill, “We are saddened by the death at the Cherry Street plant and, out of respect for family and loved ones, we cannot provide further details.”
“Our positivity rate at the plant since mid-December continues to decline,” the company added in a statement. “Testing all employees twice a week, we now have a positivity rate of less than 1%. This compares to a positivity rate in Fresno County of more than 10%. “
Foster Farms he had temporarily closed his Livingston plant in early September after an outbreak that caused nearly 400 coronavirus infections and resulted in eight deaths.
An outbreak two weeks ago at the Fresno plant also caused it to close temporarily, although it later reopened, the AP reported.
—Updated at 9:06 p.m.