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COVID, up 300% in Todd County, 128% in Minn.

For the seven days between April 30th and May 6th confirmed COVID 19 cases in Minnesota rose by 128%. That’s by far the steepest increase of any state, except Puerto Rico, according to a reports in the Guardian on May 6th and Axios on May 5th.

The increase is due, in part, to the State conducting an increasing number of tests. The Minnesota Department of Health has always said that most cases go undetected.

However by May 7th, due to increased testing and the continued spread of the virus, 1177 people, or nearly 4% of the population, in Nobles County in Southwestern Minnesota had tested positive for the virus. On May 8th, Stearns County, with a population of 150,000 people had gone from 55 confirmed a week earlier to 1,274 cases. To the south of Stearns, Kandiyohi County had 261.

Although Todd County’s numbers remain small but they grew from seven on April  30th to twenty-nine on May 8th. That’s a 300% increase and more than matches the States unprecedented increase.

The sharp increase in Nobles, Kandiyohi and Stearns counties is generally attributed to the meat processing facilities in those counties. The truth is more complex, however. 

The Minnesota Department of Health calls two meat processing facilities in Stearns County COVID-19 hotspots. They are Pilgrims Pride in Cold Spring, which processes chickens, and Jennie-O, a turkey processor in Melrose. Both facilities had worker strikes in the last year due, in part, to worker complaints about worker and food safety. Workers are demanding that the government investigate Pilgrims Pride. Jennie-O is currently closed due to COVID-19. Pilgrims Pride, which is owned by the company that operates the pork plant in Nobles County, is operating.

The majority of the confirmed cases in Stearns County are not from those two plants, however.

“In the Jennie-O facility in Kandiyohi County, there are 51 confirmed cases,” Julie Bartkey, of the Minnesota Department of Health, said. “In Stearns County, we have twelve confirmed Jennie-O cases and sixty-five confirmed cases at Pilgrim’s Pride. These are as of 4 p.m. on May 4th.”

Photo: By Greater Minnesota Work Center taken in June of 2019 when workers were protesting working conditions at Jennie-O.


Those numbers continued to increase in the following days but the total number of cases from the two poultry plants is approximately ten percent of the Stearns County total. 

The poultry plants certainly have “played a role in transmission, there’s no doubt about that,” Renee Frauendienst, Stearns County public health director, told Minnesota Public Radio. “But I don’t know that we can say it started there, but it certainly has impacted what we’re seeing in the community.”

Bartkey could not provide information about who the other 90% that tested positive were. She referred La Voz Libre to Stearns County. Stearns County referred us to the Stearns County COVID-19 Hot Line. The Hot Line was busy and not taking messages.

The other 90% may come from a population broader than the poultry plant employees, according to the St. Cloud Times. On May 5th the Times reported that Coborn’s had closed its Central Bake Shop, at 1445 Minnesota Highway 23 East, for twenty-four hours after a worker had tested positive.

Bartkey said that the Department of Health could not provide information on the ages of people who tested positive or how many people were hospitalized in individual counties. However Todd County Public Health has begun compiling data on the ages of people who have tested positive.

As of May 7th, the ten of the COVID 29 cases in Todd County were in the 50 to 59 age range. Eight others were in the 30 to 49 age range. One person six years old had tested positive and one person over seventy had tested positive.

 This article will appear in the bilingual community newspaper La Voz Libre next week. You can reach La Voz at lavozlibremn@gmail.com

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