COVID-19 in meat plants: activation of a Target Prevention Plan, in Italy

During the COVID-19 pandemics, several outbreaks have been recorded all other the world in industrial slaughterhouses and meat processing plants. Occupational preventive medicine in such non-healthcare frontline essential services accounts for combined different environmental, social, and economic factors, to reduce the burden of COVID-19 in the workplaces and in the connected residential settings. In Italy, during the first year of the pandemics, an advocacy action has been activated, targeted on meat plant managers and related food business operators. A risk-oriented control plan was agreed by competent Italian Health Authorities at Region/Province level. A questionnaire focused on the inventoried risk factors reported in the literature in such working places have been developped as supporting tool, and administered on voluntary basis to the interested stakeholders. In addition, an outbreak questionnaire was proposed to the Prevention Depts of the Local Health Units. In the 2021 - 2022 years timeframe, we collected 333 advocacy and 24 outbreak questionnaires, respectively, on 4,765 inventoried plants at national level. Responses came mainly from those districts that locally activated the risk-oriented control plan. The lack of awareness to update the Risk Assessment Document of the meat plant for COVID-19, non instrumental body Temperature checks of workers at the entrance, working force from different subcontractors, poor hygiene in the shared places and insufficient ventilation represented the main critical points recorded. The cross-checks between the results from the advocacy and from the outbreak questionnaires are feeding an after-action review for such food-chain related essential work settings within a One Health approach.