Report: County Health Inspector Tipped Off Foster Farms About COVID Inspection

Monday, March 22, 2021 | 0

Foster Farms received advanced notice that California state workplace regulators would be inspecting a chicken processing plant where at least five workers have died from COVID-19 and another 22 were hospitalized with the disease, according to a report by the Fresno Bee.

Foster Farms has two chicken processing plants in Fresno, each with more than 1,000 employees. In November, 21 of 254 workers at the facility on Cherry Avenue tested positive for COVID-19. Foster started testing all employees and by Nov. 29, about 220 of 1,000 employees were positive, the Bee reports.

Tom Fuller, an environmental health specialist with the Fresno County Department of Health, reportedly said he was “very uncomfortable” with conditions at the facility after he visited it in November before the outbreak. When the county started receiving calls in November about the outbreak, Fuller reportedly told Foster that he would be coming back for another inspection.

He also reportedly sent an email to the company on Dec. 8 that said inspectors from the Division of Occupational Safety and Health, also known as Cal/OSHA, would be showing up at 10 a.m. the next day for an inspection.

A spokesperson for Cal/OSHA told the Bee that the agency was not aware that a county official notified Foster about the inspection. The spokesperson said that while Cal/OSHA does sometimes coordinate inspections with local agencies, it expects that they will keep the information confidential.