There were over two thousand comments at the end of the premier’s daily address, a number of them calls to suspend slaughterhouse operations across the province in light of hundreds of cases connected to two provincial meat-packing plants and the recent death from exposure at the Cargill Foods facility north of High River.

“When I heard that a worker had died at Cargill today, it just makes me feel terrible; I feel devastated by this loss,” said Shawna Gray, an organizer with Animal Save Movement Canada.  “We’re talking about marginalized people who can’t leave their jobs and I’ve heard of the manipulative tactics this company is using to get them to go to work.  Now a person has died because this business cared more about slaughtering animals than about their own employees well-being and safety – I think mostly what I want to do is extend my compassion right now to those workers and their families.”

One plant has suspended operations, though no public timeline has been given.  This follows more than 500 of the cases in Alberta being connected with slaughterhouse operations.

“I think we really need to consider what kind of a threat this industry is posing to our well-being and our safety,” Gray says.  “Today we were trying to raise awareness about the connection between pandemics and our exploitation of animals, particularly raising awareness that these illnesses are zoonotic in nature – they come from animals.  If we stopped exploiting and consuming animals we’d be able to change the risk for future pandemics.”