The Department of Health is considering giving employees in the food industry priority status for COVID-19 testing, similar to frontline healthcare workers, the Irish Farmers Journal understands.

Such a move would allow employees in meat, dairy and food processing plants have priority access to COVID-19 testing in the event of an outbreak of the virus among staff at a site.

This would enable a fast turnaround of test results for the virus for food industry employees and get those with negative results back to work in a very short timeframe, instead of having to self-isolate for two weeks.

Such a move would allow employees in meat, dairy and food processing plants have priority access to COVID-19 testing in the event of an outbreak of the virus among staff at a site

The dairy industry, in particular, has been calling for priority testing status for employees at milk processing sites in a bid to reduce the risk of staff absenteeism from COVID-19, which if severe enough could potentially lead to a shutdown of a milk processing plant during the weeks of peak milk supply.

Pressure

The Irish Farmers Journal understands that the elimination of the backlog in testing for COVID-19 over the weekend has eased the initial surge in pressure on testing facilities and laboratories throughout Ireland. This easing in testing pressure could now give the Department of Health the breathing space it needs to give employees in the food sector priority status for COVID-19 testing, alongside frontline healthcare workers.