/ Being an agricultural worker “is the most beautiful thing,” Saraí says in an interview in Spanish. She asked to be identified only by her first name because she’s undocumented. Saraí hasn’t been in the fields lately, though, instead focusing on getting her three kids through virtual schooling. And while she has been spared from the virus, Sarai knows many others who’ve gotten sick. She says the pandemic has made the past year a sad and difficult one for many agricultural workers.
There have been tens of thousands of COVID-19 cases and hundreds of deaths reported among U.S. farmworkers and meat plant workers. Because there isn’t an official tracking system in place, these figures -- based largely on media reports -- are likely an undercount.