Positive cases of COVID-19 at 2 Sisters’ Coupar Angus plant have increased to 63, as cases in the local area continue to rise.
Dr Emma Fletcher, the director of public health for NHS Tayside, said the increase was expected, with many of the additional positive cases already self-isolating.
“The Incident Management Team (IMT) remains reassured that the factory can remain open at this time as we are in a very different position to when there were COVID-19 cases at the factory last August,” Fletcher added.
“2 Sisters have put in place a number of measures to reduce the risk of transmission within the factory. These have been reviewed regularly and assurance provided by the relevant regulatory authorities.”
January 19, 2021 11:13 am
The UK meat industry has warned of impending border chaos for exports, as post-Brexit checks between the UK and EU countries, including Ireland, have brought cross-border meat flows almost to a halt, even with reduced volumes of meat being exported.
This news will be of concern to Irish meat exporters, who export over €1 billion of meat products to the UK each year.
According to figures from the Central Statistics Office (CSO), Ireland’s exports of beef, pig, sheep and poultry meat to the UK in 2018 were valued at €1.3 billion.
More than three-quarters of this (€1 billion) was bovine meat, equating to 211,000t. There were also 65,000t of pigmeat, 12,000t of sheepmeat and 47,000t of poultry exported to the UK in 2018.