ArticleProceedings of the National Academy of Sciences of the United States of America2020
Livestock plants and COVID-19 transmission.
Article in Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences of the United States of America, 2020. The graph could read no effect estimate from its abstract, so it casts no vote on the map. Cited by 66 papers, 4 of them syntheses that pooled it.
What it found
Each row is one number read from the abstract, on the scale the paper reported it, with its interval. Left of the dashed line favours the treatment, right favours the comparator. Under each row is the sentence it came from. New to these charts? A ten-minute tutorial.
The abstract states no effect estimate the extractor could read, or names no intervention and outcome on the map, so this paper lights no cell and moves no belief. It is still indexed, cited and linked below.
The trial behind it
Trials whose registry record cites this paper, or whose number appears in the abstract. A trial that started after this paper was published is citing it as background, not reporting it.
Neither the registry nor the abstract names a trial number. If this is a trial report, that itself is worth knowing.
Who cites it
66 citing papers in PubMed, 4 syntheses or guidelines pooled it, 166 citations in OpenAlex.
- What is the Impact of Risk Factors on Communicable Diseases among Migrant Workers in the Gulf Cooperation Council: a Systematic Review.Journal of epidemiology and global health · 2025Pooled it
- Workplace interventions to reduce the risk of SARS-CoV-2 infection outside of healthcare settings.The Cochrane database of systematic reviews · 2024Pooled it
- Deciphering the epidemiological dynamics:Frontiers in cellular and infection microbiology · 2024Pooled it
- Workplace interventions to reduce the risk of SARS-CoV-2 infection outside of healthcare settings.The Cochrane database of systematic reviews · 2022Pooled it
- A community-engaged public health research and outreach program for immigrant and racialized workers in meat processing during the COVID-19 pandemic.BMC public health · 2026Article
- "We Were on Our Own": Animal Slaughtering and Processing Industry Workers' Perspectives on Workplace Health and Safety During the COVID-19 Pandemic in North Carolina.New solutions : a journal of environmental and occupational health policy : NS · 2026Article
- An agent-based model of COVID- 19 in the food industry for assessing public health and economic impacts of infection control strategies.Scientific reports · 2025Article
- Considering the Risks and Costs of Solid Organ Xenotransplantation.Advanced biology · 2025Article
- Immigrant workers in the meat industry during COVID-19: comparing governmental protection in Germany, the Netherlands, and the USA.Globalization and health · 2025Article
- Gaps in U.S. livestock data are a barrier to effective environmental and disease management.Environmental research letters : ERL [Web site] · 2025Article
- Predictive Modeling of Global SARS-CoV-2 Infection Risk in Animals: Unveiling Potential Reservoirs and Informing Health Policy Synergies.Transboundary and emerging diseases · 2025Article
- SARS-CoV-2 antibody prevalence by industry, workplace characteristics, and workplace infection prevention and control measures, North Carolina, USA, 2021 to 2022.Annals of work exposures and health · 2024Article
- COVID-19 transmission between the community and meat processing plants in Ireland: A retrospective modelling study.Heliyon · 2024Article
- A Novel Electronic Record System for Documentation and Efficient Workflow for Community Health Workers: Development and Usability Study.JMIR formative research · 2024Article
- Work Matters: Mainstreaming Worker Health and Safety Is Not Limited to Pandemic Response.American journal of public health · 2024Article
- Industrial Hog Operation Workers' Perspectives on Occupational Exposure to Zoonotic Pathogens: A Qualitative Pilot Study in North Carolina, USA.New solutions : a journal of environmental and occupational health policy : NS · 2024Article
- Safely and autonomously cutting meat with a collaborative robot arm.Scientific reports · 2024Article
- SARS-CoV-2 Delta variant remains viable in environmental biofilms found in meat packaging plants.PloS one · 2024Article
- Association between in situ ventilation and human-generated aerosol exposure in meatpacking plants during the COVID-19 pandemic.PloS one · 2024Article
- Impact of nasal photodisinfection on SARS-CoV-2 infection in an industrial workplace.Public health in practice (Oxford, England) · 2023Article
6 more citing papers are in PubMed but not listed here.
Corrections and comments
- Commented on by
Authors and funding
3 authors at 2 institutions in 1 country.
Funding
No grant is acknowledged in the PubMed record.
Abstract
Policy responses to the COVID-19 outbreak must strike a balance between maintaining essential supply chains and limiting the spread of the virus. Our results indicate a strong positive relationship between livestock-processing plants and local community transmission of COVID-19, suggesting that these plants may act as transmission vectors into the surrounding population and accelerate the spread of the virus beyond what would be predicted solely by population risk characteristics. We estimate the total excess COVID-19 cases and deaths associated with proximity to livestock plants to be 236,000 to 310,000 (6 to 8% of all US cases) and 4,300 to 5,200 (3 to 4% of all US deaths), respectively, as of July 21, 2020, with the vast majority likely related to community spread outside these plants. The association is found primarily among large processing facilities and large meatpacking companies. In addition, we find evidence that plant closures attenuated county-wide cases and that plants that received permission from the US Department of Agriculture to increase their production-line speeds saw more county-wide cases. Ensuring both public health and robust essential supply chains may require an increase in meatpacking oversight and potentially a shift toward more decentralized, smaller-scale meat production.
Indexed as
Identifiers
What OpenQuestion holds
Registered trials
Read under generation 80e0d062 · epoch 390. Bibliography from PubMed, PubMed Central and OpenAlex; grants from NIH RePORTER; trial links from ClinicalTrials.gov; estimates, votes and beliefs from the OpenQuestion graph.