Hispanic workers help keep NC running. Their thanks? A heavy dose of COVID-19.

Most workplaces went quiet when North Carolina shut down to stem the spread of COVID-19, but construction sites and meatpacking plants kept going strong.

That is good for the state economy and the food supply, but it has been risky for Hispanic food processing workers in plants where outbreaks are rampant and now construction sites where many Hispanics labor are becoming hot spots, according to the North Carolina Department of Health and Human Services.

This new outbreak repeats an old story: Hispanics do the hard and dangerous work and get few workplace protections or benefits. They do essential jobs, but are treated as disposable people.

Hispanics represent only about 10 percent of North Carolina’s population, but they account for 45 percent of the state’s confirmed COVID-19 cases.

Dr. Zack Moore, chief of the DHHS Epidemiology Section, has noted a sharp increase in cases among Hispanics. “We want to make sure we’re getting to this population,” he said.

No doubt Moore is sincere, but there’s also no doubt that COVID-19 is getting to Hispanic workers more readily than protection is. In part that is because their already hazardous work in food-processing plants, crop harvesting, hospitals, nursing homes and in construction has grown more so. Hispanic workers who are undocumented immigrants ineligible for unemployment benefits and other safety net programs have no option but to face the risk.

In North Carolina, the COVID-19 crisis is viewed as being centered in urban counties, which account for the largest share of confirmed infections. But the crisis is actually more intense in some rural counties with high levels of migrant farm workers and hog and turkey production.

The Farmworker Advocacy Network said state officials have failed to ensure that migrant workers are not housed in conditions where the threat of infection is high. It said COVID-19 outbreaks have been reported on 30 farms in 25 counties.

The advocacy group Action NC recently reported that in Duplin County, the state’s leader in hog production, more than one of every 50 residents has tested positive for COVID-19. That rate is much higher that the state’s two largest urban counties, Mecklenburg and Wake. The infections in rural areas hit hardest among people of color.

At least one state lawmaker thinks this outrageous toll is necessary to keep the economy going. State Rep. Jimmy Dixon, a Duplin County Republican and staunch defender of the hog industry, said during a recent committee meeting that the economy would be stronger if more people got infected and the population moved toward herd immunity.

“We’d better start addressing the economic health of this state,” Dixon said. “In my opinion we’re all going to get [COVID-19], and the sooner we get it the better off we are.”

Dixon can speak for himself. Low-income people of color with underlying health conditions and little or no access to health care want to be protected from COVID-19. That desire should be shared by state officials and North Carolina’s full congressional delegation. But so far they’ve reflected a shameful public acceptance that one group that does much of the risky work the economy needs is absorbing a heavy dose of disease.

Gov. Cooper began the right response with a June 4 executive order. It establishes a task force to focus on health disparities and environmental justice in North Carolina, promotes mass testing of migrant farm workers and food-processing plant workers and directs DHHS to ensure that all communities have access to COVID-related health care.

What’s needed next is a second COVID relief package from Congress and closer attention to protecting our Hispanic workers. They are disproportionately doing work deemed essential. Protecting them should be essential, too.

This story was originally published June 22, 2020 at 12:00 AM with the headline "Hispanic workers help keep NC running. Their thanks? A heavy dose of COVID-19.."