IOWA CITY, Iowa (AP) — The coronavirus is devastating the nation’s meatpacking communities — places like Waterloo and Sioux City in Iowa, Grand Island, Nebraska, and Worthington, Minnesota.
Within weeks, the outbreaks around slaughterhouses have turned into full-scale disasters. The virus is killing, sickening and frightening workers and devastating their extended families.
In Grand Island, an outbreak linked to a JBS beef plant that is the city’s largest employer spread rapidly across the rural central Nebraska region. It has killed more than three dozen people.
Many of the dead were elderly residents of long-term care facilities who had relatives or friends employed at the plant