2 NY Transit security officers among 41 workers killed by COVID-19
New York City NY April 11 2020
The New York Transit System has announced that 41 Transit Workers have died from the COVID-19 virus.
Among the dead are two security officers.
There are more than 6,000 other employees who have fallen sick or are self-quarantined.
Crew shortages have caused over 800 subway delays and forced 40 percent of train trips to be canceled in a single day. On one line the average wait time, usually a few minutes, ballooned to as high as 40 minutes.
Since the coronavirus pandemic engulfed New York City, it has taken a staggering toll on the Metropolitan Transportation Authority, the agency that runs the subway, buses and commuter rails and is charged with shuttling workers — like doctors, nurses and emergency responders — who are essential to keeping the city functioning.
But the transit agency may have deepened its work force crisis by not doing more during the early stages of the outbreak to protect its employees and delaying some steps laid out in a plan the M.T.A. had developed for dealing with a pandemic.
The transit agency was late to distribute disinfectant to clean shared workspaces, struggled to keep track of sick workers and failed to inform their colleagues about possible exposure to the virus, according to interviews with two dozen transit workers.
The MTA has not released the name of their deceased employees at this time.
