Human health and nutrition

Invoking the Defense Production Act, President Donald Trump announced that he plans to sign an executive order requiring meat processing facilities to continue operating through the coronavirus pandemic.

The Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) and the Occupational Safety and Health Administration (OSHA) this week released industry-specific interim guidance aimed at further protecting our nation’s essential poultry processing workforce.…

Brazilian meat processor BRF has registered 18 COVID-19 cases in an industrial hub that employs about 3,100 people in Rio Grande do Sul state, the president of a local labor union said on Monday.

Millions of pounds of beef, pork and chicken will vanish from US grocery stores as livestock and poultry processing plants have been shuttered by coronavirus outbreaks among workers, the chairman of Tyson Foods said.

Labor inspectors with the Brazilian economy ministry ordered the closing of a JBS SAchicken processing unit in southern Brazil on Friday afternoon, due to an outbreak of COVID-19 cases on site, a spokesman for the labor prosecutor's office in Rio Grande do Sul state told Reuters by telephone on Friday.…

A JBS SA poultry plant in southern Brazil was hit by an outbreak of COVID-19, a source close to the company said on condition of anonymity on Friday, marking the first large-scale infection at a Brazil-based meat plant.

In the province of British Columbia in Canada, a second poultry processing facility has reported an outbreak of COVID-19.

More than 5,000 US meat and food-processing workers have been infected with or exposed to the new coronavirus, and 13 have died, the country's largest meatpacking union said.

British Lion eggs is donating eggs to the HelpNHSHeroes, an initiative set up by volunteers to provide food boxes for NHS workers for collection at their place of work.

“These are certainly trying and unprecedented times, and chicken processors are doing everything they can to 1) keep their employees safe and 2) work to keep chicken on the shelves - in that order,” said National Chicken Council President Mike Brown.…

MAWD Pathology increases same-day COVID-19 testing using equipment on loan from Ceva.

Yum China's KFC fast food chain will begin selling plant-based fried chicken for the first time in China over a limited time period, it said on Monday.

China’s farm production and market operations face grave challenges this year as it grapples with the double threats of imported coronavirus cases and African swine fever, an official of the agriculture ministry said on Monday.…

Foster Farms is donating an additional 400,000 servings of poultry to community hunger relief organizations throughout California to help families impacted economically by COVID-19.

Argentina is braced for the first case of coronavirus to be confirmed among the thousands of port workers and grains handlers involved in the country's key agricultural export sector, local industry officials said.

India said on Sunday its hospital network is adequately prepared to tackle the spread of the coronavirus, with over 100,000 beds ready to cater to a potential surge in patient numbers.

"We’re working hard to protect team members during this challenging and ever-changing situation, while continuing to fulfill our critical role of helping feed people across the country. Our growing list of protective measures are all essential in doing as much as we can to keep COVID-19 out of the workplace," said Tyson Foods in a press release.…

At a Wayne Farms chicken processing plant in Alabama, workers recently had to pay the company 10 cents a day to buy masks to protect themselves from the new coronavirus, according to a meat inspector.

With media outlets showing empty grocery stores and hinting at potential food shortages due to panic buying, Farm Gate host ffinlo Costain sits down with Roland Bonney of FAI Farms and Jo White of Behaviour Change for Animals to discuss the psychology of panic buying and how our food system can adjust to the new normal.…

Cats can become infected with the new coronavirus but dogs appear not to be vulnerable, according to a study published on Wednesday, prompting the WHO to say it will take a closer look at transmission of the virus between humans and pets.…