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Amazon has said that just over 19,800 of its employees have tested positive for Covid-19 since the beginning of March.
Data on the e-commerce giant’s 1.37 million front-line workers, including those at its grocery stores Whole Foods Market in the United States, showed a lower-than-expected infection rate, Amazon said.
The publication of the figure comes as some logistics center workers have criticized the company’s safeguards to protect them from the pandemic, as well as its reluctance to share information about colleagues who are infected.
Amazon has increased testing to 50,000 a day at 650 sites, according to the Seattle-based company.
“Since the beginning of this crisis, we have worked hard to keep our employees informed, notifying them of every new case in their building,” Amazon said in a blog post that shares Covid-19 infection rates among its first-rate workers. line.
If the infection rate among Amazon and Whole Foods workers were the same as that of the general U.S. population, the number of cases would have exceeded 33,000, according to the company.
Amazon workers have been asking about Covid-19 infection rates at company facilities since the start of the pandemic, according to the coalition of labor and migrant activists Athena.
“Now we know why the corporation refused,” said Athena CEO Dania Rajendra.
“Amazon allowed Covid-19 to spread like wildfire at its facilities.”
Ms Rajendra called for an investigation into the spread of Covid-19 in Amazon workplaces by public health officials.
“Amazon is, in no uncertain terms, a threat to public health,” Rajendra said.
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