New report condemns government failures during Alberta Cargill COVID-19 outbreak

Edmonton, Alta. – October 2, 2026 – In 2020, Cargill's beef processing plant in High River, Alberta, was the site of the largest industrial COVID-19 outbreak in North America with devastating consequence for UFCW 401 members. The week, the Parkland Institute released the results of the first independent investigation into the crisis delivering a scathing analysis of Alberta’s failure to manage and contain the outbreak.

Drawing on hundreds of pages of records obtained through freedom-of-information requests, Essential and Expendable: How Alberta’s COVID-19 Response Failed Cargill Workers uncovers how inaction, incompetence, overconfidence, racist cultural stereotypes, and a political environment that prioritized economic interests over worker safety converged to produce a preventable tragedy in which two UFCW members and four close contacts died, dozens were hospitalized, and more than 950 workers tested positive.  

“There was nothing inevitable about the scale of the outbreak,” said Sean Tucker, lead author of the new report from Parkland Institute at the University of Alberta. As infections mounted, so did the failures across the departments and agencies involved in the response. Alberta’s OHS regulator all but abdicated its mandate and deferred to Alberta Health Services (AHS). AHS made recommendations to Cargill without ensuring they were followed. Neither OHS nor AHS used enforcement measures to secure Cargill’s compliance.

In spring 2020, Cargill’s High River plant became the site of the largest industrial COVID-19 outbreak in North America. More than 950 Cargill workers tested positive, dozens were hospitalized, and two workers and four close contacts lost their lives, according to the Parkland Institute report.

Two UFCW members died as a result of the outbreak: Bui Thi Hiep (67) and Benito Quesada (51). Their deaths are a painful reminder that the failures documented in this report were not simply mistakes on paper, they had devastating consequences for workers, their families and their communities.

“Our members have not forgotten what happened at Cargill during the pandemic,” said Thomas Hesse, President of UFCW Local 401. “They remember what it felt like to go to work afraid for their health and the health of their families. As we prepare to return to the bargaining table, those experiences matter. Workers deserve to be heard, their safety concerns deserve to be taken seriously, and no one should have to choose between earning a living and protecting their health.”

The report extensively documents the efforts made by UFCW 401 and Cargill workers during the outbreak. The union raised concerns, advocated for stronger protections and pushed government and health authorities to take action as COVID-19 spread through the plant, calling for stronger safety measures, including appropriate personal protective equipment, physical distancing and measures to protect workers who needed to stay home when sick.

UFCW 401 also pursued legal and regulatory action, worker education, public advocacy and direct engagement with authorities. The report recognizes those efforts and the barriers the union encountered.

Six years after the outbreak, Alberta has yet to publicly account for its response. No public inquiry was held. No charges were laid under occupational health and safety law or as a result of an RCMP investigation. The panel appointed by the government to review the province’s overall handling of the pandemic made no mention of the Cargill outbreak, and neither did AHS’s 244-page internal review of its pandemic response.

Report co-author Jason Foster says the findings and recommendations in Essential and Expendable have implications far beyond Cargill. “The shortcomings we identified in our report are built into Alberta’s regulatory enforcement system,” Foster says. “They potentially impact hundreds of thousands of workers across the province. We need to see the Cargill outbreak as the moment that laid bare these failures—and we need to learn from it.”

Read the full report Essential and Expendable: How Alberta’s COVID-19 Response Failed Cargill Workers.