Influx of foreign workers halted by health unit, then reversed

By Mark Ribble

WINDSOR-ESSEX — A letter of instruction issued on Wednesday, January 12 by the Windsor Essex County Health Unit (WE- CHU) put a temporary pause to Temporary Foreign Worker (TFW) arrivals in the area.

The WECHU then rescinded the letter late Friday, January 14.

Citing skyrocketing COVID case numbers for TFWs in Windsor-Essex, Dr. Shanker Nesathurai, acting Medical Officer of Health for the region, issued the letter of instruction effective at 12:01 am on Thursday, January 13.

The letter encompasses over 1,000 different farm operations in Windsor-Essex that employ TFWs and would have been in effect for at least three weeks.

“There is a public health emergency in Windsor-Essex,” said Dr. Nesathurai. “The burden of COVID among migrant farm workers exceeds our capacity to isolate them.”

With that, he announced the pausing of arrivals of any foreign workers to Windsor-Essex until at least February 2.

Friday’s statement effectively reversed the decision.

“Throughout the week the health unit has worked with all levels of government to formulate a resolution to this issue,” said the statement. “With the concerted efforts of local leaders in the healthcare, housing and social service community, the region collectively was able to establish the level of support necessary to meet isolation requirements for workers who are sick or who have been exposed. As a result of this increased capacity for isolation, the health unit has rescinded the letter.”

In recent weeks, eight agricultural farm operations had been declared in COVID outbreak. This encompassed 15 bunkhouses and forced an isolation of about 275 people.

The Windsor-Essex Isolation Centre, which has capacity for about 115 TFWs, was virtually empty January 5. It is now at capacity, according the health unit.

“We now have over 10 per cent of our Temporary Foreign Workers who are in self-isolation,” said Dr. Nesathurai. “We are running out of space for them to isolate.”

He said there were about 40 additional people who are awaiting isolation accommodation and that the health unit has procured three additional hotels to handle the overflow, but those are filling up fast.

Friday’s statement indicated that more hotels had been procured and isolation issues found some relief.

The problem, according to Dr. Nesathurai, is that the workers cannot self-isolate very easily on most farms, and he worries that once the virus takes hold, those farms will be greatly affected.

“Temporary Foreign Workers contributeimmensely to our community,” he said. “They spend their hardearned dollars here. With no isolation available, it would only be a matter of time before the virus muliplies even further in the community.”

Prior to the rescinding of the letter, Joe Sbrocchi, General Manager of the Ontario Greenhouse Vegetable Growers (OGCG), said that the health unit’s numbers were misleading and the letter of instruction would have been disastrous to the industry.

“Out of the 275 temporary foreign workers that are currently isolating, about 31 of them have actually tested positive for COVID and none of them have severe symptoms,” he said Friday morning. “Where’s the common sense?”

Sbrocchi said that the announcement on Wednesday came as a total surprise to his organization and area growers.

“They never consulted us or called us at all,” he said. “I’ve not heard from the good doctor.”

“The workers that are returning here are 95 percent (or more) double vaccinated,” he said. “They’re coming back because they love it here.”

“We disagree with many of the numbers put out by the health unit,” he added.

According to OGVG records, for vegetable growers only, there are currently 1,000-1,200 workers here and another 700-900 would have been affected by the paused arrivals.

Sbrocchi says the farms can better handle the situation themselves.

“We can take better care of those people on the farms, ” he said.