Of the more than 1,200 employees at Fieldale Farms in Cornelia, president Tom Hensley says that 120 of those workers have contracted COVID-19. He maintains that Fieldale considers their facilities to be “safe workplaces” among rumors of unsafe practices and employee termination; Hensley says that these rumors aren’t true.
In an April interview, Hensley said that Fieldale’s policy for those employees who test positive for COVID-19 is to send them, as well as those who work around them, home for ten days with pay. An anonymous source claims that a family member contracted COVID-19, and a week later, that family member was told that they had to return to work or they would be fired. Hensley was adamant that this didn’t happen.
“No way that happened, we don’t want anyone coming to work with COVID-19, that is not true at all,” Hensley says. “I’m not familiar with the circumstance that you described, but I can assure you that would never happen. Why would we do that?”
Hensley commented on a similar situation, also brought forth by an anonymous source, claiming that someone’s spouse tested positive for COVID-19, but they were still required to come into work. Hensley says Fieldale doesn’t have a policy in place for employees who have been exposed to the virus at home. He says that employees are not asked if they have been exposed to the virus before they enter the plant, either.
“Just, because someone else has it [COVID-19], doesn’t necessarily mean you have it,” Hensley says.
The CDC has concluded that COVID-19 can be transmitted from asymptomatic and presymptomatic patients. Hensley says that if someone were to be exposed to COVID-19 and become asymptomatic carriers, they could stay home from work, however, they would not be paid during the time they quarantine.
Hensley says that regardless of whether an employee exposed to COVID-19 becomes infected or not, choosing to stay home would not cost them their job. “They wouldn’t have to be worried about being fired, that’s for sure,” Hensley says. “We don’t fire people for that. We’re having trouble enough [getting people to work].”
While Hensley can confirm that there aren’t as many people in the plant as normal, he says that it’s because Fieldale asks employees that don’t feel well to not come into work, not because employees are afraid of contracting COVID-19 in the plant. “No one is getting the virus at work, [I’m] a hundred percent confident of that,” Hensley says.
Hensley says that every worker in the plant is required to wear a mask, gloves, shoe covers, and a smock. He says new hygienic equipment such as these are given out daily at no charge, contrary to what some employees have claimed. Hensley says that Fieldale requiring payment for hygienic equipment is “not true at all.”
A concerned employee claimed that there is a large tub of water outside of the plant’s entrance, which employees have to dip their hands in before they can enter the plant. Hensley clarified that this tub contains a disinfectant similar to Lysol, not water. “It’s not strong enough to hurt you, or blister your skin,” Hensley says. He says the disinfectant is changed daily.
Of the 120 employees who have contracted COVID-19, 80 of them have returned to work. “And when you get home, if you don’t social distance, then you can get the virus and maybe bring it to work with you,” Hensley says. “But you’re not spreading [it] at work.”
