Shocking but Not Surprising: COVID and Class

Details: Published on Sunday, 16 August 2020 03:04; Written by editor

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A Socialist Project e-bulletin ... No. 2170 ... August 16, 2020
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Shocking but Not Surprising: COVID and Class

Eric Tucker

A recent Toronto Star article, by Sara Mojtehedzadeh and Jennifer Yang, "More than 180 workers at this Toronto bakery got COVID-19," and reproduced below, reveals a large COVID outbreak at FGF Brands, a major industrial bakery in Toronto, where 184 workers tested positive and one died. That outbreak began in mid-April, but we are only hearing about it now. On reading the article I was simultaneously shocked but not surprised. How can that be?

It is shocking when we read that the essential workers, who continued to report to their jobs through the COVID-19 pandemic, in this case literally to make our daily bread, are not adequately protected against the risk of workplace spread of infection. Whether through insufficient engineering controls, cleaning, physical distancing or provision of personal protective equipment, these workers were placed at a highly elevated risk of contracting this highly infectious disease. This is indeed shocking.

It is also shocking when we hear that the workers who are exposed to these... conditions are also largely recruited from poor immigrant communities that experience multiple social disadvantages and labour market discrimination, leaving them at the bottom of the labour market where a "good" job is one that pays slightly more than the minimum wage. But even these jobs are often not available and so many people work through temporary agencies, often paid less than the low-wage workers who they work alongside of and, as reported here, are often deprived of even minimum benefits such as two days of paid sick leave.