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Class of '66 Old Fart

Coronavirus and Its Impact

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I have a serious question: Don't we have to eat?

I feel terrible for these workers but we kind of need the food and the supply chain or else we die from hunger?

This is coming from me as a vegetarian but when I hear about positive tests at grocery stores or meat food processing plants we can't just close them. PEOPLE NEED TO EAT.

I am all for social distancing and this is really serious but unfortunately in certain industry's like law enforcement, healthcare and food you can't just close things. If people test positive I would think you have to keep the plant open and isolate those workers till virus runs its course and unfortunately some might die just like health care workers. Are we going to close hospitals?

I really hope more people don't starve and die of other things because we are so worried about getting rid of Covid.

Stay safe everyone and practice social distancing if you can and you should but please don't close work places that provide necessary services for people to survive over this.

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8 minutes ago, Aaron said:

I have a serious question: Don't we have to eat?

I feel terrible for these workers but we kind of need the food and the supply chain or else we die from hunger?

This is coming from me as a vegetarian but when I hear about positive tests at grocery stores or meat food processing plants we can't just close them. PEOPLE NEED TO EAT.

I am all for social distancing and this is really serious but unfortunately in certain industry's like law enforcement, healthcare and food you can't just close things. If people test positive I would think you have to keep the plant open and isolate those workers till virus runs its course and unfortunately some might die just like health care workers. Are we going to close hospitals?

I really hope more people don't starve and die of other things because we are so worried about getting rid of Covid.

Stay safe everyone and practice social distancing if you can and you should but please don't close work places that provide necessary services for people to survive over this.

I would imagine if it gets to the point where there is a true shortage National Guardsmen will be sent to make up any labor shortcomings after governors order plants reopened. 

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12 minutes ago, Aaron said:

This is coming from me as a vegetarian

Always nice to hear from another one. A meat shortage might impact what I buy, especially now that we simply call it plant based.

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19 minutes ago, cthomas said:

Always nice to hear from another one. A meat shortage might impact what I buy, especially now that we simply call it plant based.

Here's the thing. If we run out of meat people will go for the meatless products. As of now life as a vegetarian has been pretty good at the store because people don't go for the meat substitutes in large numbers. The problem is if the meat runs dry people will go for that.

In the long term I would love more plant based eating and there is more than enough plants in the world to make meat substitutes for the whole planet. One day I would love to see that but have nothing against people eating meat.

The problem is short term we are set up as a meat eating society. Look at grocery stores. The reason shelves are running low at times is not because we are low on food but because society is half restaurant based and half grocery store based. Now that everything is grocery based things for restaurants and large food serving places are literally being thrown out with nothing to do with them and grocery stores have not been able to compensate for the increased demand.

Shutting down meat industry sounds great but we are not set up that way and if it stops and everyone goes for the plant based stuff that will quickly run dry.

Long term society can hopefully go more plant based(and we seem to be headed in that direction) but in the middle of a pandemic you need to keep food supply as normal as possible and shutting down meat facilities is only going to put further strain on grocery stores providing the food people NEED to eat.

Food and meat processing plants at moment need to be treated like hospitals and under no circumstances shut down and isolate the infected and keep others working if they can. 

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1 hour ago, Aaron said:

I have a serious question: Don't we have to eat?

I feel terrible for these workers but we kind of need the food and the supply chain or else we die from hunger?

This is coming from me as a vegetarian but when I hear about positive tests at grocery stores or meat food processing plants we can't just close them. PEOPLE NEED TO EAT.

I am all for social distancing and this is really serious but unfortunately in certain industry's like law enforcement, healthcare and food you can't just close things. If people test positive I would think you have to keep the plant open and isolate those workers till virus runs its course and unfortunately some might die just like health care workers. Are we going to close hospitals?

 

We haven't seen the spread in law enforcement and healthcare like we've seen at some of these meat processing plants.  I think when the issues at the Smithfield plant occurred the positive tests at this one plant accounted for half of all of the cases in South Dakota.  Let's also face the fact that people in healthcare and law enforcement went into those fields to be in public safety.  

I am 100% pro-meat......could be a carnivore if I needed to.  But if you policemen and health care workers knew when they signed up for the job that there were risks of dangerous, life altering risks in their field and may a conscious decision to do so in large part because of the reward of saving live.  It's also a something that they can physically see happening.  No one goes into a job at a meat processing plant to earn $30,000 or so a year because they feel they are going to save lives.  Unless the risk is cut down or the reward becomes greater than the risk, you aren't just talking about losing workers to coronavirus -- you are also talking about those that aren't choosing not to come back until they feel it is safe.  And it's not a simple manner of replacing them -- any turnover in employees means extra training and slower production.

 

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1 hour ago, Aaron said:

Food and meat processing plants at moment need to be treated like hospitals and under no circumstances shut down and isolate the infected and keep others working if they can. 

I think (can't find numbers, but do remember earlier reports) at this point most of the shutdowns have been short in nature to clean the facilities.  A couple lately have been longer.  

Here's a good (but long) article on the situation.  Part of the issue, as someone mentioned earlier, is that the corporations (like Tyson) are not following safe guidelines.

https://www.usatoday.com/in-depth/news/investigations/2020/04/22/meat-packing-plants-covid-may-force-choice-worker-health-food/2995232001/

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Something I will say.....I have found that since schools closed and I've been e-teaching (since March 13th) and obeying all of the guidelines as much as possible, my family has been eating everything we buy -- that is, nothing is getting thrown out.  Leftovers aren't just sitting in the fridge for a few days and then getting tossed when they go bad, produce isn't spoiling because it hasn't been eaten.  I think that is happening more often now and at the minimum, a drop in food waste is helpful in combatting some food shortage issues.  The less you throw away, the less you have to buy, and the more there is available for others in a shortage situation.

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8 hours ago, brumdog45 said:

Something I will say.....I have found that since schools closed and I've been e-teaching (since March 13th) and obeying all of the guidelines as much as possible, my family has been eating everything we buy -- that is, nothing is getting thrown out.  Leftovers aren't just sitting in the fridge for a few days and then getting tossed when they go bad, produce isn't spoiling because it hasn't been eaten.  I think that is happening more often now and at the minimum, a drop in food waste is helpful in combatting some food shortage issues.  The less you throw away, the less you have to buy, and the more there is available for others in a shortage situation.

At the risk of showing myself as being a stereotypical millennial - If you have some produce that might be close to the edge, I would recommend trying out some fermentation styles.

My personal favorite is putting harder veggies (or fruit) in a vacuum seal bag with 2-3% salt and vacuum seal. It is cool because you can see the fermentation at work as the bag fills with air. Gives the byproduct a nice tangy flavor if that is your thing. I personally like to do it to tomatoes and make some pasta sauce!

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If you've never been through a meat or poultry processing plant as I have, it is an eye opener and trying to maintain social distancing in such a plant is a near impossibility.  What follows may not sit well with some of you but it is a fact.  I live in Logansport so I think I'm qualified to speak on the subject. Plus I think I'm in good health, but I am in the 70-80 age bracket so just a little concerned about what's taking place in Logansport.

The Logansport plant (and I'll make a broad assumption that most of Tyson's other plants) work forces are weighted towards Hispanics and Asians.  In Logansport, a great many of these workers and their families live in old 2-story homes converted into apartments and it's not atypical that 12 or more people are living in one such dwelling unit.  When they go to the grocery store, Home Depot or to Wal-Mart, the whole freakin' family goes along so it's not hard to understand why these meat processing plants become human petri dishes and locally we've experienced such a spike in confirmed cases. 

When COVID-19 first started becoming a pandemic, our numbers were low and it felt like living in a predominantly rural county would be beneficial.  Then we learn that Tyson knew what was happening in their Iowa plants but it was business as usual in Logansport.  Now we have a real local crisis on our hands.    

 

 

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Wow people in Michigan are saying the government is testing drones on a small town to measure for fever and coughing. I guess people are legit shooting at the drone.


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18 minutes ago, mdn82 said:

Wow people in Michigan are saying the government is testing drones on a small town to measure for fever and coughing. I guess people are legit shooting at the drone.


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I can hear the conspiracy theories now.

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Don’t they know that they can’t measure your temperature through tin foil?

Never underestimate human stupidity.

Michigan people I guess are looking at this as an invasion of privacy mainly on the weed industry. Don’t ask me why cause it’s legal, but my guess is people are growing more than they should.


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If you've never been through a meat or poultry processing plant as I have, it is an eye opener and trying to maintain social distancing in such a plant is a near impossibility.  What follows may not sit well with some of you but it is a fact.  I live in Logansport so I think I'm qualified to speak on the subject. Plus I think I'm in good health, but I am in the 70-80 age bracket so just a little concerned about what's taking place in Logansport.
The Logansport plant (and I'll make a broad assumption that most of Tyson's other plants) work forces are weighted towards Hispanics and Asians.  In Logansport, a great many of these workers and their families live in old 2-story homes converted into apartments and it's not atypical that 12 or more people are living in one such dwelling unit.  When they go to the grocery store, Home Depot or to Wal-Mart, the whole freakin' family goes along so it's not hard to understand why these meat processing plants become human petri dishes and locally we've experienced such a spike in confirmed cases. 
When COVID-19 first started becoming a pandemic, our numbers were low and it felt like living in a predominantly rural county would be beneficial.  Then we learn that Tyson knew what was happening in their Iowa plants but it was business as usual in Logansport.  Now we have a real local crisis on our hands.    
 
 


You couldn’t have said this any better. Been in some of these homes. Lot of people in them.


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13 hours ago, cthomas said:

Always nice to hear from another one. A meat shortage might impact what I buy, especially now that we simply call it plant based.

 

12 hours ago, Aaron said:

Here's the thing. If we run out of meat people will go for the meatless products. As of now life as a vegetarian has been pretty good at the store because people don't go for the meat substitutes in large numbers. The problem is if the meat runs dry people will go for that.

In the long term I would love more plant based eating and there is more than enough plants in the world to make meat substitutes for the whole planet. One day I would love to see that but have nothing against people eating meat.

The problem is short term we are set up as a meat eating society. Look at grocery stores. The reason shelves are running low at times is not because we are low on food but because society is half restaurant based and half grocery store based. Now that everything is grocery based things for restaurants and large food serving places are literally being thrown out with nothing to do with them and grocery stores have not been able to compensate for the increased demand.

Shutting down meat industry sounds great but we are not set up that way and if it stops and everyone goes for the plant based stuff that will quickly run dry.

Long term society can hopefully go more plant based(and we seem to be headed in that direction) but in the middle of a pandemic you need to keep food supply as normal as possible and shutting down meat facilities is only going to put further strain on grocery stores providing the food people NEED to eat.

Food and meat processing plants at moment need to be treated like hospitals and under no circumstances shut down and isolate the infected and keep others working if they can. 

While in my home the family tries to follow a vegan diet.  But we are flexitarian when it comes to actually labeling our diet.  I find when I order out vegan options are slim to none in my area and I do enjoy eating all the meat based products from time to time.  During this pandemic we have been 'treating ourselves' with taco night once a week, so we've been cheating in the house but it gives me something to look forward too!  ;-)

Here's the thing, eating meat is believed to have started this whole pandemic.  Something to think about.

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8 minutes ago, Lebowski said:

 

While in my home the family tries to follow a vegan diet.  But we are flexitarian when it comes to actually labeling our diet.  I find when I order out vegan options are slim to none in my area and I do enjoy eating all the meat based products from time to time.  During this pandemic we have been 'treating ourselves' with taco night once a week, so we've been cheating in the house but it gives me something to look forward too!  ;-)

Here's the thing, eating meat is believed to have started this whole pandemic.  Something to think about.

I apologize in advance for going off topic here, but since the wet markets in China have been implicated in the virus transmission, maybe there is a slight connection. I grew up on a farm consisting of a dairy herd, livestock, and about 600 acres of corn, soy beans, oats, and sometimes wheat. We had a huge garden that supplied a significant part of our food supply. Meat came from home grown animals (pork, beef, poultry, etc.) and dairy from our milk operation. Nearly everything we ate came from our farm. Growing up around, and caring for, a variety of animals affected me in ways I didn't understand until several years later. Simply put, I got to know the animals and their personalities. They are way more complex than most people realize. One day I understood that I couldn't kill the animals that I was eating and at that point I quit asking someone else to do it for me. I've been meat free since 1971. I don't judge others or promote my lifestyle to those who choose differently. I simply live my life as consistently with what I believe as I can and let others do the same.

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9 minutes ago, cthomas said:

I apologize in advance for going off topic here, but since the wet markets in China have been implicated in the virus transmission, maybe there is a slight connection. I grew up on a farm consisting of a dairy herd, livestock, and about 600 acres of corn, soy beans, oats, and sometimes wheat. We had a huge garden that supplied a significant part of our food supply. Meat came from home grown animals (pork, beef, poultry, etc.) and dairy from our milk operation. Nearly everything we ate came from our farm. Growing up around, and caring for, a variety of animals affected me in ways I didn't understand until several years later. Simply put, I got to know the animals and their personalities. They are way more complex than most people realize. One day I understood that I couldn't kill the animals that I was eating and at that point I quit asking someone else to do it for me. I've been meat free since 1971. I don't judge others or promote my lifestyle to those who choose differently. I simply live my life as consistently with what I believe as I can and let others do the same.

I would call it a major connection and the smoking gun but I'm just some dude on the internet filled with pointless opinions in the grand scheme of things. 

Yeah, since this pandemic started, multiple times a day my wife says, 'Stop eating meat people!'  And I agree with you wholeheartedly about animals.  I'm trying to go completely plant based diet but it's difficult for me.  I'm addicted to eggs, cheese and pizza.

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