Outbreak at Edmonton's Canada Post facility `inevitable': union official
It's a small miracle an outbreak of COVID-19 hasn't happened at Edmonton's Canada Post processing plant, says the local union president.
The postal service has been operating non-stop across the country following a rise in demand from Canadians looking to ship packages during the holiday season.
Canada Post spokeswoman Nicole Lecompte said in an email Wednesday holiday parcel volume started a week earlier than usual in mid-november and heavy peak levels are anticipated to continue beyond Christmas.
Edmonton union president Roland Schmidt said between 600 to 700 workers spread out over three shifts are at the city's processing plant, which he described as being as big as four football fields. He said the protocols in place have been enough to prevent an outbreak from happening but he's concerned about workers catching the virus while in the community.
“For the past few months, the Alberta government hasn't really taken these concerns seriously about how spread can go,” Schmidt said. “With cases going up, it's just inevitable that our workers get infected outside of work and unknowingly bring it into work. The fact that we haven't had an internal outbreak yet is kind of a small miracle.”
He said he hopes the new measures brought in by the province earlier this month make a difference in curbing the spread.
Schmidt said there have been 47 presumptive and confirmed cases of the virus among workers at various facilities in the area since Nov. 9.
A record-setting 1.1 million parcels were processed across the country over the weekend, followed by another 2.3 million on Monday.
Schmidt guessed the volume of parcels had gone up roughly 50 per cent from last year, with trucks lined up outside of the plant for hours. He said packages from Winnipeg are being diverted to Edmonton to alleviate some of the operational burdens there, although he wasn't sure if that would cause any more delays to local packages.
Schmidt said so far, workers are keeping pace with the demand.
“Edmonton has one of the biggest processing hubs in western Canada,” he said. “A lot of product is diverted (here). It's Vancouver, Edmonton and then you have the gigantic mega-hub out of the Toronto area. We just continue to ask for people's patience and understanding. Our workers are doing their best in a very stressful
We just continue to ask for people's patience and understanding. Our workers are doing their best in a very stressful circumstance.
circumstance.”
Canada Post in a news release on Monday said the company added more than 4,000 seasonal employees, increased their fleet by more than 1,000 vehicles and is working with commercial customers to manage the flow of parcels. Canadians are encouraged to ship their packages as early as possible.
Lecompte said in her email that while parcel processing and delivery is expected to continue at a high pace throughout December, customers may experience some delays.