Meat plants: ‘An investigation is only as good as the action it delivers’

“An investigation is only as good as the action it delivers,” according to TD Matt Carthy, who has “cautiously” welcomed research commencing into the transmission of Covid-19 in meat plants.

From December 1, funding has been made available to hire researchers to work with state agencies and meat plant operators on finding solutions to control and prevent the spread of Covid-19 in workplaces.

The Sinn Féin TD has called on Minister for Agriculture Charlie McConalogue to outline the intended timeline of this investigation, saying that “while the investigation must be thorough, time is also a critical factor here, given the real implications for many workers in these plants and the wider community”.

‘I do have a number of concerns’

The Cavan-Monaghan TD said:

“Ideally, such an investigation would have begun months ago. Much of our time at the Oireachtas Special Committee on Covid-19 was taken up dealing with outbreaks at meat plants, so it has long been apparent that this was necessary.

“While I welcome that this investigation has now commenced, I do have a number of concerns.”

One such concern is that the investigation indicates that environmental sampling was carried out in a meat plant during the course of a pilot study in July/August, “but makes no reference to further sampling”.

“There were a number of outbreaks in meat plants since that period and if sampling was not carried out at these factories, it will limit the potential of this investigation from the beginning,” the deputy continued.

An investigation is also only as good as the action it delivers; and I am cognisant that this government has chosen to disregard recommendations of several studies carried out with regard to meat plants in the past.

“The National Outbreak Control Team [NOCT] recommended in July that the Minister for Health enact legislation to allow for the closure of meat plants, and this advice was rejected by the government.

“I was also particularly surprised that while the minister [McConalogue] chose to focus on the likely significant transmission vector of chilled air re-circulation, no reference is made to any other potential modes of transmission such as the working and living conditions of workers.

“The minister references a research group involved in a large-scale study of an outbreak within a meat plant in Germany. It appears that he alluded to research I cited at the Covid committee, carried out by Thomas Gunther et al.

“I would therefore draw the minister’s attention to the finding that while other factors, such as shared accommodation or travel to work did not appear to play a role in the initial outbreak, they may well have been a ‘confounding factor in the context of the second, larger outbreak’.”

The deputy added that with Covid-19 restrictions having eased recently for the Christmas period, it is “crucially important that we do not repeat the mistakes of the past that led to severe clusters”.

“That must mean that there is a robust monitoring process of the meat processing sector.”