PORTLAND, Ore. — There are 89 active COVID-19 workplace outbreaks in Oregon as of this week, down from 96 reported last week by the Oregon Health Authority (OHA). Nearly 10,000 people in the state have tested positive for the coronavirus in relation to workplace outbreaks.
Health officials track outbreaks of five or more employees at workplaces where there are at least 30 workers. An outbreak remains active if there has been a case within the past 28 days. The case count for each workplace includes everyone who is linked to the outbreak, whether they are workers or a close contact.
OHA said there have been 53 deaths and 9,967 cases associated with workplace outbreaks in Oregon during the pandemic. That’s 194 more cases than officials reported last week.
The largest active outbreak remains at the Snake River Correctional Institution in Ontario. The outbreak was first identified on June 24 and the case count has continued to rise since then. There have been 547 coronavirus cases linked to the outbreak, with the most recent onset reported on Nov. 17
The three largest active workplace outbreaks in Oregon are at prisons:
- Snake River Correctional Institution, Ontario: 547 cases (most)
- Eastern Oregon Correctional Institution, Pendleton: 518 cases (second-most)
- Oregon State Correctional Institution, Salem: 179 cases (third-most)
The list below includes active workplace outbreaks (Table 7), meaning that there has been a case within the past 28 days.
Food processing and packaging facilities have also been hot spots for COVID-19 outbreaks in the workplace. Lamb Weston East, a potato processing facility in Boardman, has been linked to 86 cases, with the most recent case reported on Nov. 20.
Distribution centers have also been connected to numerous coronavirus outbreaks. Amazon Troutdale has been linked to 97 COVID-19 cases, the fourth-largest workplace outbreak in the state. The Fred Meyer Distribution Center in Clackamas, with 88 associated cases, and the Walmart Distribution Center in Hermiston, connected to 79 cases, are also among the 10 largest active workplace outbreaks.
Health officials also reported a list of 76 workplaces where COVID-19 outbreaks have been resolved (Table 8) over the last eight weeks. Outbreaks are considered resolved if there hasn’t been a known case in 28 days.
New to the resolved list is Lamb Weston in Hermiston, which was previously the third-largest active workplace outbreak in the state with 192 associated COVID-19 cases. That outbreak is now considered resolved since the most recent known case was reported on Oct. 25.
