United States multinational technology company Amazon said on Thursday that more than 19,800 of its employees have tested positive for the coronavirus, AFP reported.
The e-commerce giant has 13.7 crore workers, including those at its Whole Foods Market grocery stores in the United States. Amazon said the infection rate is lower than expected. The company added that if the rate of infection among Amazon and Whole Foods workers were the same as the general United States population, the number of cases would have been higher than 33,000.
Amazon said it has been testing 50,000 employees a day across 650 sites. “Since the beginning of this crisis, we’ve worked hard to keep our employees informed, notifying them of every new case in their building,” the company said in a statement.
In a blog post, Amazon also said that it has invested approximately $4 billion (Rs 29,359 crore) on coronavirus-related initiatives in the second quarter of 2020-’21 “getting products to customers and keeping employees safe”.
“We’ve distributed personal protective gear, such as masks for our employees, and implemented disinfectant spraying and temperature checks across our operations worldwide,” the company said. Persons diagnosed with Covid-19 get two weeks’ time off, apart from their other available leaves, the company added. Amazon also said it is offering health benefits to employees from the time they join.
The company said it has implemented enhanced cleaning and social distancing measures to avoid contamination. It added that all front line employees and partners who were with the company throughout the month of June will receive a bonus.
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