Labor group says Amazon massively underreported Covid cases contracted at work

The company’s reporting amounts to a “hidden pandemic,” according to a coalition of four unions interested in establishing representation for Amazon workers.

“The company systematically failed to record Covid-19 cases in its warehouses, recording only 27 work-related illnesses for all of 2020 in the category that includes Covid-19 infections,” said the report from the Strategic Organizing Center, which is made up of the Teamsters union, the Service Employees Union, the Communication Workers of America and the United Farm Workers of America.
The group notes that Amazon put out a statement to employees on October 1, 2020, in which it said that 19,816 US employees had tested positive for Covid through September 19 of that year, prior to the late-year surge that increased the number of cases nationwide.

The labor group has sent a complaint to Assistant Secretary of Labor Douglas Parker, urging the Occupational Health and Safety Administration to investigate … Read more