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Seasonal farm labor and COVID-19 spread.

Diane Charlton
Published in: Applied economic perspectives and policy (2021)
The COVID-19 pandemic in 2020 caused unprecedented shocks to agricultural food systems, including increased risk to worker health, labor-related input costs, and production uncertainty. Despite employer precautions, there were numerous worksite outbreaks of COVID-19. This paper examines the relationship between month-to-month variation in historical agricultural employment and changes in the incidence of confirmed COVID-19 cases and deaths within U.S. counties from April to August 2020. The results show that employment of 100 additional workers in fruit, vegetable, and horticultural production was associated with 4.5% more COVID-19 cases within counties or an additional 18.65 COVID-19 cases and 0.34 additional COVID-19 deaths per 100,000 individuals in the county workforce.
Keyphrases
  • coronavirus disease
  • sars cov
  • public health
  • healthcare
  • climate change
  • heavy metals
  • mental health
  • human health