Following the lead of Foster Farms and Perdue Farms, having initiated COVID vaccination of workers in their plants, JBS USA and Pilgrim’s Pride will vaccinate employees in nine major locations in eight states where vaccine will be made available. In some plants, large-scale vaccination clinics will administer vaccine, but in other locations limitations on availability of vaccines and State policy on priority will result in inevitable mosaics of immunity in a given facility which is undesirable.
Tyson Foods intends extending vaccination to as many 15,000 employees in Iowa during the first week of March. Cargill is also administering vaccines to workers. Smithfield Foods is awaiting vaccine for the Sioux Falls, SD. plant where more than a third of the 3,700 employees tested positive for the virus by mid-June 2020. Vaccination in large plants may only be completed by late April.
It is considered imperative that workers in meat packing plants and poultry processing facilities should be vaccinated given their proximity on processing lines and in cafeterias and change areas. Associations representing the livestock industry have actively promoted vaccination for plant workers given their vulnerability and their impact on communities in which large plants are located.