Coronavirus: Hyundai Motor reports one employee in US testing positive

Hyundai Motor has confirmed a case of Covid-19 among its workforce at the Alabama plant in United States. The individual who tested positive is not currently on site. The company has notified the Alabama Department of Public Health of this case.

Hyundai decided to suspend production in all areas, for all shifts, beginning Wednesday, March 18, 2020. The company has already deployed additional sanitation measures across the entire facility and will now follow ADPH’s protocols for disinfecting the affected work area. Hyundai will confer with ADPH and the CDC to determine if additional measures should be taken.

Hyundai issued a statement saying "the health and well-being of our Team Members is a top priority for our company. We are following ADPH’s protocols for disinfecting the affected work area and deploying additional sanitation measures across the entire facility. Once HMMA’s environment, health, and safety team have determined that the affected area has been sufficiently sanitized and production is safe to resume, our team members will be informed."

Earlier, another Hyundai Motor worker had tested positive for the new coronavirus, leading to a suspension of production at one its factories in South Korea's southeastern city of Ulsan.

A union spokesman confirmed that a worker had tested positive, but he did not have more details.

"The company has also placed colleagues who came in close contact with the infected employee in self-quarantine and taken steps to have them tested for possible infection," Hyundai Motor said in a news release. The company added that it was disinfecting the factory.

Ulsan is less than an hour from Daegu, the epicentre of outbreak in Korea.

Among other carmakers in US, a worker at Fiat Chrysler Automobiles NV’s transmission plant in Kokomo, Indiana, had tested positive for the coronavirus.

General Motors Co and Ford Motor Co said on Tuesday they each have had one employee, both working at U.S. engineering centers, test positive for coronavirus.