FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE: May 12, 2022 
CONTACT: Sarah Little (443) 440-0029

WASHINGTON, DC - The North American Meat Institute, the nation's trade association for meat and poultry packers and processors, today said the House Select Subcommittee on the Coronavirus Crisis' partisan report distorts the truth about the meat and poultry industry's work to protect employees during the COVID-19 pandemic.

The following is a statement from Julie Anna Potts, President and CEO of the North American Meat Institute:

"The Meat Institute and its member companies voluntarily provided hundreds of thousands of pages to the Committee. The report ignores the rigorous and comprehensive measures companies enacted to protect employees and support their critical infrastructure workers.

"The meat and poultry industry, like many industries, was challenged by the pandemic in the spring of 2020. As more became known about the spread of the virus, the meat industry spent billions of dollars to reverse the pandemic's trajectory, protecting meat and poultry workers while keeping food on Americans' tables and our farm economy working."

"The House Select Committee has done the nation a disservice. The Committee could have tried to learn what the industry did to stop the spread of COVID among meat and poultry workers, reducing positive cases associated with the industry while cases were surging across the country. Instead, the Committee uses 20/20 hindsight and cherry picks data to support a narrative that is completely unrepresentative of the early days of an unprecedented national emergency."

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About North American Meat Institute 
The Meat Institute is the United States' oldest and largest trade association representing packers and processors of beef, pork, lamb, veal, turkey, and processed meat products. NAMI members include more than 350 meat packing and processing companies, the majority of which have fewer than 100 employees, and account for more than 95 percent of the United States' output of meat and 70 percent of turkey production.