COVID-19 protections not offered to migrant seafood workers
By VANESSA SÁNCHEZ PULLA, TRISHA AHMED, BRITTANY NICOLE GADDY, LUCIANA PEREZ URIBE GUINASSI, CARMEN MOLINA ACOSTA, SOPHIA SORENSEN AND AADIT TAMBE/The Howard Center for Investigative Journalism May 12, 2021 GMT
FISHING CREEK, Md. (AP) For thousands of miles and over two days in April, 59 workers from Mexico traveled together on a bus despite the pandemic to their legal, seasonal jobs as crabmeat pickers and seafood processors in Maryland’s rural islands.
Lindy’s Seafood Inc., the wholesale crab and oyster company in Maryland that hired the workers, paid for their cross-country trip. The company put them to work the day after they arrived without quarantining or waiting for COVID-19 test results. Those safeguards are not required under state or federal law.