GUELPH – An outbreak of COVID-19 at Cargill Canada’s Dunlop Drive location in Guelph is over, but another persists at the company’s Watson Parkway location.
Danny Williamson, spokesperson for Wellington-Dufferin-Guelph Public Health, said on Feb. 2 the 188 cases at Dunlop Drive have all been cleared, but there are now 16 confirmed cases at Watson Parkway.
The Dunlop Drive facility went into outbreak on Dec. 17 and the company voluntarily closed the affected portions of the plant. It re-opened Dec. 29 in a limited way and resumed full operations on Jan. 2.
By Jan. 13 there were five cases at the Watson Parkway location. That has now grown to 16 cases.
Earlier in January, Cargill spokesperson Daniel Sullivan told the Advertiser that the company is working with public health on contact tracing and had put in mitigation measures to contain the spread.
“The protocols we put in place to support our staff at production facilities and in the field — including personal protective equipment (PPE) and physical barriers, increased sanitation, social distancing, temperature testing, travel restrictions and visitor restrictions — continue,” Sullivan said.
“We want to work with everyone to focus on keeping people healthy and delivering safe food to people across Canada.”
There has been one death connected with the Cargill outbreak – a bus driver hired by an outside company to transport employees to the Dunlop Drive facility.
