-Lexington, Nebraska, the former frontier trading post,
is now home to over 10,000 people,
mostly immigrants from Mexico, Central America, and Africa.
About 25% of them work here at the Tyson Foods
meat-packing plant.
And a number of them are coming down with coronavirus.
-[speaking Spanish] -Headache, fever, and fatigue.
As we started getting out of the worst of it,
we started to develop a loss of sense of smell and taste.
-This woman and her husband both work at Tyson,
and both got COVID-19.
She is not revealing her identity
for fear of retaliation.
Her son translates for her.
-She said she's really scared to go back just 'cause
she doesn't know what has been done,
and she doesn't want to risk getting re-infected again
and redoing this whole process for the past more
than a month that we've been quarantined.
-Nearly 600 workers at various meat-packing plants
across Nebraska tested positive for the coronavirus in April,
with at least one death.
That's according to the latest numbers from the CDC.
But they don't tell the full story.
-They're seeing lower numbers in regards to coming in.
A lot of individuals are calling in sick
because they don't feel safe in Tyson Foods.
So their production is slowing down.
-Gladys Cox is a community organizer in Lexington.
-Now, just recently, everybody received a text message
saying that they're going to receive
a $30-a-day bonus if they come to work.
So our population is low-income population.
And to us, it seems like an incentive to come to work
even though you may be sick.
There was a representative at one of the meetings,
and she said, "You know, they're not required to work.
They don't need to come to work."
But if they don't come to work, they don't get food.
If they don't come to work, they're not able to feed
their family, pay the rent.
-This is what it normally looks
like inside a Tyson meat-packing plant.
This video was shot before the pandemic
and handed out by the company.
It shows an environment where health officials say a virus
can spread quickly, with workers in close proximity
and an assembly line that never stops moving.
Now, today, those assembly lines are depleted
because workers are either sick or just afraid to go in,
thus the beginnings of the beef shortages across America.
Now, we reached out to Tyson Foods.
We wanted to find out how they were moving forward
during the pandemic,
how they were going to take care of their employees,
but we did not get a response.
What we did do was go to their website,
and we found videos and photos that we've downloaded.
We also found a message from one of their vice presidents,
Hector Gonzalez, explaining how they're going to move forward.
-We understand that people are anxious during this
very challenging time,
which is why we believe information is the best tool
for combating this virus.
We want our team members to express their concerns
so that we have an opportunity to address them
timely and properly.
-But rights advocates say workers at these plants
are afraid of coming forward with their concerns,
worried it will cost them their job.
-Workers are concerned about their protections,
and we've heard statements from workers
that they are being forced to work or retaliated against,
but they don't know their rights as far as congregating
and organizing for their rights.
-[coughs]
[speaking Spanish] -This Tyson worker with COVID-19
spoke to us anonymously over the phone.
-I haven't been to work,
so they just haven't checked in with me.
They haven't asked me how I'm doing --
or how we're doing.
-What we do know from the Tyson website is that
in the past several weeks, workers' temperatures
are being monitored through infrared technology,
and social distancing has become procedure inside the plants.
-[speaking Spanish] -These measures should have been
implemented a long time ago.
A lot of other companies were able to implement them,
and people didn't suffer as much.
They're worried more about profit than their workers.
-I would hate to say that's the sentiment,
but unfortunately, that's what we're getting.
You know, Tyson Foods keeps telling us that they care
about essential workers,
but if they would have cared, they would have shut it down
for two weeks, you know, cleaned it out,
and given everybody a test before they could come back.
-Tyson Foods says it's doing
all it can to keep its workers safe.
-We've required face coverings
and have performed deep cleaning at a number of our facilities.
We're extremely grateful for the work our team members are doing
and for the role they play in the critical supply chain
that extends from farm to fork.
-President Trump has ordered meat-packing plants to stay open
during the pandemic to avoid food shortages.
In places like Lexington,
where workers live paycheck to paycheck,
many have no choice but to keep showing up.
-The economy's going down. The community --
This is a large employer in the community,
and, you know, who knows how this is gonna impact
the workers in this community.
But she said, God willing,
hopefully we can come out of this.
-At the beginning of the pandemic,
testing in Nebraska was limited to first responders,
healthcare workers, and those with more severe symptoms.
A new testing initiative, TestNebraska,
aims to dramatically increase access
over the next month or so.
-We want to make sure that our family members, our neighbors,
and our community are safe,
to be able to provide that food safely to your table.
So it is not a divisive issue.
This is a humanitarian issue.
We want to make sure our family members are safe.