The Fifth Estate

Amazon unpacked (47x2)

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In the blur of stories this year about COVID-19, one in particular, a story involving e-commerce giant Amazon, caught our eye. An Amazon warehouse in Brampton, Ont. was ordered to close temporarily last spring. Staff were told to stay home and isolate themselves. We learned there had been 600 COVID-19 cases at the plant since the fall of 2020. That's when we decided to look closely at Amazon and its handling of COVID-19. Yes — Amazon is a huge employer with thousands of staff in Canada alone. People were bound to get sick. But, we also knew that because of the pandemic, business skyrocketed as more and more people shopped from home. In fact, Amazon’s own company figures show that net profit worldwide grew by a staggering 84 per cent in 2020. Our big question became: Was there a human cost to that convenience?