Sugar factory shut down in Malawi due to Indian Covid-19 variant scare By Reuters Share MALAWI has ordered a sugar factory to suspend its operations after 41 workers tested positive for the novel coronavirus and one died, Malawi media reported on Friday. Daily newspaper The Nation reported that health experts were of the view that closing down the Salima Sugar Factory alone was not enough, and called for extensive contact tracing and screening of community members surrounding the factory, as the Covid-19 variant might have originated in India, where 22 out of the 41 local and foreign workers who tested positive recently came from.