General Manager Jack Schultheis said that Kwik’pak Fisheries employs up to 400 workers each day, all of whom will have to show their COVID-19 vaccination cards before beginning work this season.
“Customers are extremely concerned over who is manufacturing the food they re buying from us,” Schultheis said. “So we re trying to protect our workers, the community, and the people who eat the food we produce.”
On the company’s Facebook page, Kwik’pak wrote that some of its customers are mandating that the companies that they buy fish from have all their employees vaccinated. On the same Facebook post, Kwik’pak wrote that it’s requesting all fishermen get vaccinated as well. However, Schultheis said that fishermen will not be required to be vaccinated because they are independent contractors and not Kwik’pak employees.
Ravn Alaska is resuming regular flights to Aniak from Anchorage on Feb. 26. It s the first community in the Yukon-Kuskokwim Delta where Ravn is expanding service. The airline shut down after declaring bankruptcy last summer and has since entered new ownership. KYUK s Anna Rose MacArthur talks with Ravn CEO Rob McKinney about the airline returning to the region.
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Over three times as many people in the Yukon-Kuskokwim Delta have received both doses of a COVID-19 vaccine as compared to the rest of the nation. Dr. Ellen Hodges, Chief of Staff at the Yukon-Kuskokwim Health Corporation, talks with KYUK News Director Anna Rose MacArthur about how the region became a national leader in COVID-19 vaccinations.
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Over 300,000 people in the United States have died from COVID-19. That’s over 300,000 families who have lost loved ones to the virus, and we have the story from one of those families who lives in Bethel. Liane White is the mother of four children. Her husband, Kevin White, died in November at age 35 from complications due to COVID-19. KYUK’s Anna Rose MacArthur talked with Liane last week.
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