A meat plant in County Tipperary has confirmed that 22 of its workers have now tested positive for COVID-19.
ABP Cahir said the 22 cases were detected after 460 staff members were screened for the virus.
The first case was detected at the plant nearly two weeks’ week ago, before eight more were announced last Thursday.
In a statement this morning, the company said the HSE is carrying out contact tracing of all 22 staff-members and has identified 16 cases outside of the factory as a result.
All close contacts of the confirmed cases are now self-isolating.
The factory has been operating at a ‘limited capacity’ since the first positive test on August 14th.
ABP said it has taken on a range of protective measures since the outbreak began – including limiting access to essential workers and introducing temperature checks, staggered break times and Perspex partitions where appropriate.
It said safety and public health is its priority and it will continue to work with the HSE and HSA regarding the outbreak.
Reporting from Eoghan Murphy
