now, please, get out of my house before i call the police. this is "nightline." >> tonight, america's newest covid-19 cluster. one of the nation's biggest pork-producing plants. over 500 workers infected and spreading it in a state that never issued a stay-at-home order. >> what made you think it wasn't safe? >> how our country's meat supply may take a hit. plus, risky business, fast food workers on the front lines of the pandemic. >> we need these safety measures. this is life or death. >> taking on mcdonald's, taking their demands for protection to the picket lines. aprecious first breath. the mom in a coma giving life. "nightline" starts right now, with byron pitts.

>> good evening. thank you for joining us. president trump today outlining a plan to reopen america. one of the requirements, states will have to go two weeks without seeing a rise in covid-19 cases. tonight, that's a challenge south dakota is now struggling to contain. here's my "nightline" co-anchor, juju chang. >> reporter: far from the hellish hospital scenes in new york city, nestled in the nation's heartland, sioux falls, south dakota. now home to one of the biggest covid-19 clusters in the u.s. the epicenter at this smith d-19d pork processing plant wit of rk, employing 40,000 people across the country, forced to shut down the sioux falls plant this week. some employees say they've been

worried for weeks about their health and their families'. was there a lot of fear among your co-workers? >> of course, everybody was with a lot of fear to go to work every single day. >> reporter: and so what made them go to work? >> that they don't want to lose their jobs. >> reporter: the outbreak outlining the protection of workers while maintaining the country's food chain remains secure. >> for me, one person wasn't enough to shut it down, because we have a lot of contact, you know. >> reporter: she didn't want to reveal her name, even after quitting last week, after having worked there, she says, for more than ten years. >> i was thinking that it was not a safe place to work. and especially to preseotect my family. >> reporter: what made you think it wasn't safe? >> there is no social distance. we are working all together. we are working in lines. >> reporter: one foot asmart pao

feet asmart. >> no. a few inches. >> reporter: she says they were a good employer with a 401(k) but for her the risks were no longer worth the benefits. >> they told us in the first meeting that we are essential workers and we need to keep working to provide all the food to the tables, but, at the same point, we are humans. we need to be healthy to keep working. >> reporter: last week people took to the streets in sioux falls to bring attention to workers' safety concerns. >> everybody was afraid that if they didn't get protective gear soon that it was going to escalate. so we felt that we needed to be the voice of the working company here. >> reporter: for nancy reynosa, a community organizer and founder of kay pawsa sioux falls, it's personal.

>> any other time it's not a problem. but we have covid-19, and we've known this for several months, the problem is we're trying to social distance, and we have people working in close contact with each other, shoulder to shoulder, working for hours upon hours. >> reporter: the city's mayor, paul tanhacken was also beginning to sound the alarm. >> the course has grown over the course of four or five days. >> reporter: south dakota is one of nine states issuing no stay at home orders. instead, the governor urging constituents to stay home. >> we have seen such an outstanding call to action among the people of south dakota. the way people have stepped up in south dakota and taken it seriously has been phenomenal. >> reporter: governor nome has said south dakota is not new york but as you point out is one of the single biggest clusters

in the country right now. >> i don't like making the news for being a county and a city growing at the rate we are growing. >> reporter: last friday, smith field announced it would shut the plant down for three days in order to clean the facility. then on sunday, the company declared it would suspend operations at the plant until further notice. >> this virus can spread so unbelievably quick. and i think smith field would agree with this, that it snuck up on them like it snuck up on a lot of other businesses. two cases can turn into ten can turn into 50 like that. >> reporter: smithfield issuing a statement raidieading in part unfortunately, covid-19 cases are now ubiquitous across the country. we have continued to run our facilities for one reason, to sustain our nation's food supply during the pandemic. the company says it will continue to compensate its employees for the next two

weeks. smithfield isn't alone. several of the nation's biggest meat and poultry suppliers have been stricken with covid cases. tyson was forced to close after workers were sickened. the company said they were deeply saddened by the loss of two team members. both smith field and tiesyson s they've issued social distancing in their plant, some measures include protective gear and plexiglass barriers between team members. but beyond the factory, the mayor is taking it a step further. >> we're taking positions right now on a municipal level to potentially look at shelter in place orders and things we can do on a city level and take action on a local level, at least try. >> our thanks to juju. we've seen how a health problem can affect the meat supply. now many factories enforcing

extra precautions so they won't be next. one of them, purdue. i spoke to the chairman of purdue farms. thanks so much for joining us. i saw earlier the long list of measures your company's taking to keep your employees safe. can you just share a couple of those with our audience please? >> we have a couple advantages. we have wellness centers in all our plants. these are buildings in the plant staffed by nurses and doctors from the local community. and we're utilizing them a lot right now. secondly, we have a tremendous cleaning, eight-hour cleaning shift every day. and the plant has to be inspected by the usda in order to run. so it starts off very clean. when our associates come to work now, they go through a temperate inar seov, masks, enter the facility. we took doors off, knobs off and

put partitions between each worker to mitigate contact. >>ive abeen to your plants and i know how communal the work can be. how challenge something that to implement social distancing at your plants? >> it is a challenge. that's why i think as an industry we're very innovative as an industry. and so we used to debone a lot more chicken breasts. so the consumer may have to put up with a bone-in breast like my grandmother used to deal with. that way you don't have to have as many pimozide by side trimming, and can you help with the distancing issue. >> i know my aunts in north carolina will be happy to hear about the bone-in chicken that you will be putting out now. how is purdue responding to americans who might be facing food insecurity at this time? >> you know, our facilities are in somewhat rural areas. where maybe there isn't as much access to grocery stores and

that sort of thing. so number one, something our associates told us, they don't have time to go shopping for food. so we give them chicken every week when they go home. secondly, we're sending trucks to all of the communities where we have operations, and we sell at wholesale, and so when we alternate that each week. >> jim purdue, chairman of purdue farms. thank you, sir. we wish you, your family, your company continued grace. thank you so much. >> and you, too, byron, thank you. up next, why some of our most vulnerable workers in the front lines of covid-19 are saying enough is enough.

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♪ forging forward on the front lines of covid-19, workers deep in the trenches, keeping the country fed and running. now some are saying no more, unless their voices and demands are met. 8-year-old mati is the light and joy of his mother adrianna alvarez. >> i hope he realizes i will do anything to care for him. >> the single mom has worked at

an mcdonald's outside chicago for almost at any years. >> i love when the customers get their food, knowing ty es $.4nougho support e says then her lifeline is now potentially life threatening. >> now they're cutting our hours and essential work ares. now we were just burger flippers who should go to college and get a job. now we're keeping the economy floating. we've been important. people fail to realize it. >> with millions of americans staying home, workers like adrianna are feeding america, staffing drive luthrough window and fulfilling grocery store orders. some say they're doing their jobs without the protections they need to keep themselves and their customers safe. >> we deserve hazard pay, paid sick leave. we're risking going to work and

getting paid the same poverty wages and i don't think that as fair. >> she's part of the fight for 15 movement, starting out advocating raising the minimum wage to $15. since the pandemic, the group has started strikes around the country. >> i've been working here for 14 years. i just walked off my job and went on strike today. >> i am the guy who is in the drive through. >> yesterday the group helped organize an online strike of mcdonald's workers, including adrianna. >> this is life or death. someone in california, at least three people in california have had covid cases, and one of them is fighting for her life on a ventilator. >> that person is sonya hernandez, jennifer hernandez's mother. >> she's a loving mom. she gave everything for us. she was a single mom for us. and she worked at mcdonald's for

18 years. >> it was her job at mcdonald's that allowed sonya to provide for her family. jennifer says sonya at the time wasn't given gloves or face mask at work. she began feeling ill in march but continued to work. she tested positive for covid-19 in early april, after her health took a turn for the worse. >> my cousin, she texted me that there were going to take my mom to the hospital. my mom called us, like my brothers and my sister and me. she called us saying that she was going to have to go in the ventilator, and they were going to put her under sedation. >> that was the last call jennifer had with her mother. >> she told me, i want you guys to take care, and i want you to take care of the kids. that was before she was put in the machine. take care of everyone. >> sonya is now in critical

condition. >> we have to make the decision if she, if her heart stops, what, if we want them to resuscitate her or to just let her leave in peace. peace. peac. >> p an employee from the park store asks in part that the companies instruct all the workers who were exposed directly or indirectly to self-quarantine. mcdonalds said when they were notified of the covid-19 diagnosis, they immediately reached out to four other crew members that had come in close contact with the employee, instructing them to self-quarantine for 14 days, and that the restaurant was closed overnight for routine deep cleaning. >> the workers, i would say, you know, just fight for your right.

because today's my mom. tomorrow, i don't know. it could be theirs or it could be them. >> mcdonald's telling abc news they've changed nearly 50 processes since february, including adding employee wellness and temperature checks and are confident employees impacted by the virus are receiving paid sick leave. they are also exploring hero pay bonuses, adding our number one priority is the health and well-being of our people. >> if you feel like you're doing the appropriate measures to keep us safe, then come on down and work with us. come on down. so that they can see exactly what we have to go through and how anxious we feel, just to be at work. but if we're not at work we can't feed our kids. we can't feed our families. we can't feed ourselves. >> it's not just fast food workers raising their voices. gig workers have claimed to be unsafe on the job as well.

vanessa bain walked off her job as an instacart shopper despite her job being more in demand. >> the underlying crisis is that, you know, more work than ever is precarious. people don't have savings accounts. people are not in a position where they're earning income that is in surplus to their expenses. >> we turned off the app. we asked for the, you know, the ppes, which, you know, that was the last thing they gave in to, but then again, like i said, they didn't make them readily available. >> by some estimates, more than a third of u.s. workers are a part of the gig economy. and what a lot of companies have done to get around paying greater amounts of benefits to their employees is hiring gig workers. but ultimately, what we're seeing through this crisis is how perilous a gig-working job is. >> instacart said over the past few weeks they have

consistently, proactively communicated with the shopper community to make sure they have the support they need, and they have secured health and safety kits to distribute to shoppers across the community. earlier this week, senator elizabeth warren and ro khannaha introduced a bill for workers that could be in the next federal relief package. >> they don't listen to us if it's just one person. the more people, the more power we have. and up next for us, the mom fighting covid-19 who gave birth while in a coma. >> your mom wants to meet you. my tiny little angel. thought i g my moderate to severe crohn's disease. until i realized something was missing... me. you ok, sis? my symptoms were keeping me from really being there for my sisters. (announcement) "final boarding for flight 2007 to chicago" so i talked to my doctor and learned humira is for people who still have symptoms of crohn's disease

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whaso let's do the rightver chanthing, today.ow. let's stay at home. let's wash up. let's always keep our distance - please, six feet apart at least. let's look after ourselves, as well as others. it will all be worth it. we can all do our part. so those on the front line can do their part. and when this is over, we will all, continue,

to thrive.

and finally tonight, the moment to embrace. that's 27-year-old respiratory therapist, angela, holding her 15-day-old daughter for the first time. when she was more than 30 weeks pregnant she was hospitalized with covid-19 and put on a ventilator. her doctors made the difficult decision to deliver the baby while angela was still in a

medically-induced coma. even after recovery, leaving the icu, it was days before she could see her daughter. >> the world wants to meet you, my tiny little angel. she is so petite and so little. >> the baby's name? ava. for "breath of life." how wonderful is that? it was 17th century french philosopher who said out of difficulties grow miracles. that's "nightline" for this evening, thanks for the company, america, see you right back here tomorrow night, same time. goodnight. ♪ ba, da, ba, ba, da, ba, ba, da,ba ♪ ♪ ba, da, ba, ba, da, ba, ba, da,ba ♪ ♪ jimmy kimmel live ♪ this is ridiculous. from his house! >> jimmy: hello and welcome to my home. i'm dr. sanjay gupta. i think. right? i could be him. i'm honestly not sure anymore.

i'm in a house doing a show, to no one. i'm starting to understand why mr. rogers started using puppets. a special hello to those of you who watched the disney family sing along tonight. i don't know about you, but for me every day is a disney family sing along. today marks one full month since kids have been home from school here in los angeles. more than anything, i miss that rush of endorphins you feel when the car door slams shut, and you peel out of the preschool parking lot like a duke of hazzard. my cousin sal and his wife decided they're sending their kids back to school on may 1st no matter what. even if it's closed. if it's closed, they can hang out by the hopscotch area until three o'clock. there is word now that students may take the sat and act tests from home this year. wow, if only felicity huffman had waited --