Sofia, Bulgaria: Nurses and other medical professionals barricaded themselves in the Health Commission offices. Demands include decent salaries, improvement of working conditions and reform to save public healthcare as well as opposition to the commercialisation of healthcare. [March 6, 2020]

Pomigliano, Naples, Italy: A wildcat strike by hundreds of workers shut down Fiat/Chrysler’s best selling Panda assembly line for most of the day. [March 10, 2020]

Italy: Strikes spread all over the contry, mainly in the North, the more industrilezed area. Regime Unions (Cgil, Cisl, Uil) refuse to call for a general strike despite many of their more active members organize strike in the factories. One of the largest "rank and file" unions, Usb, called a 32 hour national stike in all non-essential workplaces and for a 15 days strike in manufacturing in the region Emilia Romagna (where the union have most of members in the sector), already begun [March 12, 2020]

Detroit, Michigan: A series of wildcats and threats of strikes have caused the “Big Three” auto producers - General Motors, Ford and Fiat/Chrysler to halt production for 2 weeks in order to provide COVID-19 protection for production workers.

Wildcat work stoppages at Fiat-Chrysler’s Detroit Sterling Heights Assembly Plant began after workers learned that two co-workers had been quarantined with the COVID-19. “The second shift normally ends at 3:00 a.m., but the company ended up closing the plant at 10:30 p.m. Morning shift workers came into the plant but stood by and refused to work. Management gave up after three hours and sent them home...Local Leadership stood with us the entire time...

Workers at Chrysler’s Windsor Assembly Plant in Ontario walked off the job after a co-worker was quarantined at home.

On March 17, workers shut down the paint shop at Chrysler’s Warren Truck Assembly Plant in Detroit. [March 17, 2020 via Labor Notes]

Minnesota: The State of Minnesota Democratic governor has classified Grocery Clerks as Emergency Workers and is limiting strike freedoms. Says the sniveling cowards at the regime union AFSME “We won’t stand in the way of the state’s powerful response to this crisis, but we won’t idly sit by if that power is abused... Our job as a union is to make sure that during this worldwide crisis, Minnesota workers are still protected and safe at work.” The only protection workers have comes from using the power you have to stop work. [March 18, 2020]

Detroit, Michigan, USA: Detroit area bus drivers self organized and proclaimed that they wanted safety precautions and stopped work. City managers spun the truth by calling the strike a “the driver shortage.” The Amalgamated Transit Union supported the action, in less than 24 hours, the drivers won their demands. Fare collection was also suspended. [March 18, 2020]

Fort Worth, Texas: Iron Workers walk off site for health and safety reaasons.

Izmir, Turkey: Metropolitan Municipality workers at the Directorate of Parks and Gardens, Directorate of Water and Sewers and other units have stopped work because masks, gloves and other protective material in response to the corona outbreak weren’t distributed among them. The workers are members of Genel-Is (Public Services Employees Union) Izmir Branch No 2, which is a part of the leftist DISK (Progressive Workers Unions Confederation). The number of strikers is currently unknown. [March 19, 2020]

Sacramento, California: Electricians walked off an expansion of the Kaiser Hospital construction project this morning. [March 19, 2020]

Oakland, California: Dockworkers are threatening to refuse work at a terminal that they say isn’t properly sanitizing equipment and facilities for employees. “They’re trying to have us come in and clean the equipment. That’s not our job, that’s their job,” Demands include sanitizing equipment, work areas, terminal bathrooms, mechanic shops, tools, machines, turnstiles and gates. [March 20, 2020]

Istanbul, Turkey: 40 Galataport construction workers went on strike in Istanbul due to lack of precautions regarding the COVID-19. [March 20, 2020]

Istanbul, Turkey: Upon the post office’s decision to allow the permanent staff not to work on Saturday, while requiring subcontracted workers to continue working, subcontracted workers went on strike and won. [March 21, 2020]

Istanbul, Turkey: 800 meter reading workers working for the Istanbul Metropolitan Municipality went on strike against the lack of precautions against the COVID-19. Management has the workers the day off the strike off. Enerji Sen (Energy Workers Union belonging to DISK) had earlier made a call for immediate precautions in the sector.

[Update] Meter readers and Enerji - Sent (DISK) went to the Istanbul Water Directorate tied to Istanbul Metropolitan Municipality to discuss their demands regarding protection from the virus, yet no one talked to them be cause of... the virus. The workers staged a protest in front of the building. Enerji - Sen chairman called for the citizens to react to the Istanbul Metropolitan Municipality, and say they don’t want to see bills at their door [March 21, 2020]

Portland, Oregon, USA: the Industrial Workers of the World are conducting 3 industrial actions in the face of the pandemic.

12 employees laid off from “Crush”, a queer restaurant/bar occupied the bar after being laid off. They were demanding legally required payment for accrued sick days. The business owner met all demands. Evidently there is no intersection between the employing and working class.

The workers at the nationally famous Voodoo Doughnut store chain have walked out demanding better physical security at work, wage increases. And with a growing concern of the COVID-19 virus, employees are now also demanding the company provide an additional $2 an hour for hazard pay for their continued work with customers and the general public. The IWW is also demanding severance pay and access to all accrued Paid Time Off for all employees laid off due to the COVID-19 crisis, as well as for all employees who will be laid off due to the COVID-19 crisis.”

The IWW workers at the Burgerville restaurant chain are out on strike demanding $2 hazard pay, 2 weeks severance for laid off workers, 2 weeks sick pay, and a cash out of all benefits (vacation and sick pay) upon COVID-19 lay off. [March 22, 2020]

Kathleen, Georgia, USA: 50 employees walked out of the Perdue Chicken processing plant for health and safty reasons around COVID-19. "We’re not getting nothing - no type of compensation, no nothing, not even no cleanliness, no extra pay-no nothing. We’re up here risking our life for chicken", said employee Kendaliyn Granville. [March 23]

Alberta, Canada: A dozen Edmonton nurses have defied an order by Alberta Health Services to resume testing for COVID-19 without N95 masks. [March 24, 2020]

Pittsburg, Pennsylvania, USA: Dozens of sanitation workers are refusing to work without health protections. [March 25, 2020]

The workers in a filter factory in Hatay, Southern Turkey Sent on strike and won paid leave until April 30th. The number of workers or whether they belong to the union is unknown. [March 26, 2020]

Morgantown, West Virginia, USA: Sabraton Kroger Pharmacy workers today walked off the job due to a unsafe working environment. [March 27, 2020]

40 Workers at Linden Foods in Dungannon, Northern Ireland have walked out over a "total absence of social distancing measures". [March 27, 2020]

 

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