PTP Response to COVID 19 Update 5/1/2020

Friday, May 1, 2020

 

May 1, 2020

To our Customers, Employees and Community,

The COVID-19 pandemic has created a truly unprecedented situation which affects us all. Our hearts go out to anyone who’s been impacted by the virus, either directly or indirectly.  This global pandemic is affecting all of us, our families, businesses, communities, and the way of life we all enjoyed up until this crisis began, of which we have no doubt we will get back to hopefully soon. Trust, we will get there, but right now, we wanted to reach out to customers, vendors, employees, clients, and our community to update you on how we’re approaching the situation at Process Technologies & Packaging.

Deemed an essential business during this crisis, Process Technologies & Packaging continues to operate to address the current and escalating need for hand sanitizer, liquid hand soap and cleanser/personal hygiene products. Supporting our customers and community’s needs brought on by the crisis, is a priority.

During this difficult period, we are using our capabilities to produce essential products to make and donate hand sanitizer to local first-responders.  We are also leveraging our supply chain to help many organizations and local communities acquire needed safety gear they require.

As a GMP compliant facility, we have added to our existing general manufacturing procedures, specifically, by providing ALL employees at all facilities with non-surgical masks supporting the CDC’s recommendations, especially when social distancing measures may be difficult to maintain.  Ensuring that our employees are provided with the necessary PPE for the work performed is of utmost importance at this critical time.

We have also employed a variety of measures to increase the safety of our employees working during this period, emphasing strongly that their health & safety are a priority to Process Technologies & Packaging.

To ensure customer needs are met we have successfully transitioned to telecommuting  arrangements with office staff so that we can support your needs at this time and to ensure that you are getting the level of service you have come to expect from us.

In our facilities we have extensive cleaning and sanitizing taking place on a daily basis. Third party contracts providing hospital grade disinfection services have been contracted with to provide a higher degree of sanitization.

Work schedules and staffing levels have been adjusted as management works toward operating with limited capacity, as we learn to incorporate social distancing and intensified hygiene measures to protect our employees.  Additionally, to ensure the health and safety of our workforce we are tracking our employees’ wellness through various measures such as daily temperature checks at the start of the shift, weekly self-assessment questionnaires, and continual monitoring by management to ensure sick employees stay home.

Additionally, we created many safeguards to help maintain social distancing during the process which would normally have many employees in one area.  We rearranged timing of breaks and lunches to limit the number of people in the break-room, keeping with the required recommendations to break up larger groups. We continue to monitor these initiatives and will change according to the government recommendations.

To stay current and to better support the needs of our employees and customers, Process Technologies & Packaging has taken precautionary measures, which go above and beyond that which is requested by the Pa Department of Health or the local, state and federal government.

To date here are some of those extraordinary measures;

  • Daily reminders of CDC’s recommended guidance on proper hand hygiene
  • Training, posters & video on loop in break room of proper hand washing protocol – in multiple languages (including English, Spanish and Gujarti)
  • Increased number of hand sanitizer units throughout the facilities (there is one at every door leading to another room)
  • Office and lab personnel provided with company-produced sanitizer
  • Stressing the importance of respiratory hygiene – covering any coughs/sneezes with your elbow and not your hands as well as to try to not touch your face any other time
  • All employees are given a mask that they can dispose of at end of their shift and are provided with a new one each day. Please note that these are non-surgical/medical masks in accordance with CDC and state guidelines.
  • Safety glasses and/or gloves are previously supplied as per regular GMP
  • Encourage employees to stay home if they are not feeling well. This is also included in the self-assessment questionnaire that are filled out weekly (upon employees’ return from a multi-day break from work including weekends)
  • The facility is thoroughly cleaned and disinfected at end of every shift. During the shift, the common areas are continuously sanitized.
  • We contracted with a hospital grade cleaning service to disinfect common areas including; entrance, cafeteria, bathrooms, time clock, locker cabinets and other common surfaces.
  • We contracted a Dry Fog Decontamination service to disinfect various production areas. Dry fog is effective against a wide range of pathogens (bacteria, viruses, and spores). This technique and protocol is approved by the EPA.
  • We are waiting for receipt of our own dry fog equipment and certifying appropriate employees to bring this decontamination process in house to increase the frequency.
  • Upon arrival at the start of their shifts, all employees will have their temperature taken as a way to monitor the wellness of our staff. Any employee with a temperature of 100.0 degrees or higher will be asked to return home. Symptomatic people will not be allowed to return to work until cleared by a medical provider.
  • Limited Access to the facilities to only Process Technologies & Packaging employees and essential outside visitors. All vendor and customer meetings have been rescheduled to be done remotely
  • Delivery drivers will not be allowed access inside the facilities
  • Bins for FEDEX and UPS have been set up outside main building
  • Updated our receiving procedures to include a week (7 calendar days) quarantine on all goods that are air shipped to us.

As you can see we have taken this situation seriously and will continue to do so; please note the above list is subject to change as additional guidelines are communicated to us or as necessary to provide for the health and well-being of our employees. We truly feel we are Part of the Process and you can count on us.

In closing, the entire Process Technologies & Packaging team is confident by working together we can defeat COVID-19.

If you should have any questions; please do not hesitate to reach out to our Marketing or Sales Department.

Sincerely,

PTP COVID-19 Response Task Force

PTP Develops and Implements Appropriate Policies to Help Protect Workforce

Wednesday, April 22, 2020

April 22, 2020

Process Technologies & Packaging is committed to health and safety. In accordance with Federal, State, and local regulations, the following policies  have been implemented:

  1. Daily Reminders of the CDC’s Recommended Guidance on Behaviors:
  • Wash your hands with soap and water for 20 seconds – the time it takes to sing “Happy Birthday” twice.
  • Use hand sanitizer if soap and water are not available
  • Cover any coughs or sneezes with your elbow,  not with your hands,
  • Try not to touch your face, especially after touching surfaces
  • Sanitize surfaces and common areas frequently
  • Wear a mask
  • Stay home if you don’t feel well

2. Daily Temperature Checks:

  • Upon arrival at work, all employees will have their temperature taken
  • Any employee with a temperature of 100.0 degrees or higher will be asked to return home. Symptomatic people will not be allowed to return to work until cleared by a medical provider

3. Masks are Mandatory

4. Limited Access to Facility/Reduce the Number of People to Increase Distance

  • Employees that can work from home are working on a rotating schedule
  • Ban on non essential outside visitors

5. Cleaning Initiative

  • Strict adherence to GMP’s
  • Frequent sanitizing of surfaces and common areas throughout the day
  • PTP contracted with a hospital grade cleaning service to disinfect common areas including; entrance, cafeteria, bathrooms, time clock, locker cabinets and other common surfaces.
  • PTP contracted a Dry Fog Decontamination service to disinfect complex equipment,  Dry Fog is efficacious against wide range of pathogens (bacteria, viruses, and spores) and the technique and protocol approved by the EPA.    *PTP is in the process of purchasing the equipment and certifying appropriate employees to bring this decontamination process in house to increase effectiveness.

Information has been shared via emails, posted signs and verbally, in English, Spanish and Gujarti.

PTP Early Prevention to Protect Workers From COVID-19

Monday, April 20, 2020

April 20, 2020 Scranton, PA, The Times-Tribune 
 

JAKE DANNA STEVENS / STAFF PHOTOGRAPHER

Process Technologies and Packaging in Scott Twp. on Wednesday. Process Technologies and its affiliate company, Seokoh, started taking employees’ temperatures March 23, five days after the first coronavirus case appeared in Lackawanna County.

Early, decisive prevention at an area cosmetics factory might have saved hundreds of workers from catching COVID-19.

Process Technologies and its affiliate company, Seokoh, started taking employees’ temperatures March 23, five days after the first case appeared in Lackawanna County and four days before the most stringent restrictions on movement locally came down from Harrisburg.

The contract makeup manufacturer has nearly 300 workers across multiple sites in Lackawanna County and roots in South Korea, a country revered for how it’s handling the pandemic without shutting down its economy.

Company controller

Shawnna Giumento said they received guidance from their Korean counterparts on how to stave off the disease early. Those steps helped them get an employee away from others long before anyone knew that worker had the disease.

Warehousing and many types of manufacturing are allowed to stay open under Gov. Tom Wolf’s sweeping ban on non-life-sustaining businesses.

In Luzerne County, tens of thousands of employees who flock to giant warehouses around Hazleton, Hanover Twp. and Pittston Twp. magnify the odds of spreading it faster and farther.

Luzerne County has three times as many confirmed cases as Lackawanna County, with the heaviest concentration in and around Hazleton where the largest business parks are.

It’s different in Lackawanna County, where the nascent warehouse build-out hasn’t reached Luzerne County’s level.

“Our warehousing/distribution is much different than in Hazleton,” said Andy Skrip, a vice president at the Greater Scranton Chamber of Commerce.

The chamber’s development arm, SLIBCO, which Skrip leads, had a hand in developing most of the county’s 23 business and industrial parks.

“We have more parks. The employment is spread out,” he said.

Two large scale, pending projects in the Valley View Business Park — a Chewy.com distribution center and another spec building under construction by developer Trammell Crow Co. — are on the order of Luzerne County’s largest sites, but they’re not operational yet, and construction has stalled due to COVID-19.

Operating warehouses might still be allowed. Building new ones is not.

Lackawanna County’s workforce profile is different, too.

Luzerne County has twice as many working-age, Latino residents, according to U.S. Census data. Immigrants who come from impoverished or war-torn countries sometimes distrust government, so they might ignore official edicts to shelter in place, said Teri Ooms. She’s the director at the Institute, a public policy think tank funded by area colleges.

Language barriers could impede important public safety messages. Public information announcements would be more effective if they appeared in other languages so the region’s immigrants from Gujarat, Bhutan, and the Congo can understand, as well as in English and Spanish, she said.

‘It’s good news’

On the morning of March 31, a temperature check stopped one employee at the door at Process Technologies. That person was sent home with a fever, Giumento said.

Thirteen days later, just this week, test results for COVID-19 came back positive. It’s the only confirmed case the company has had so far, she said.

“It’s good news for us that we were able to catch it before it got through the company,” she said.

The company has reduced two shifts to one to allow cleaning crews to disinfect, she said. Employees fill out weekly questionnaires to screen out anyone who might have been exposed to infection. Breaks are staggered so not everyone is taking them at once.

Lackawanna County manufacturers and distributors did a fair job preparing, said Craig Pawlick, the secretary-treasurer for the Teamsters Local 229 in Scranton. The union local represents 1,100 workers, most of them in essential industries and service jobs, across Northeastern Pennsylvania.

Topps, the company that makes Ring Pop candy in Scranton, started preventive measures in late February/early March, he said.

Under Wolf’s order, confection manufacturers may keep the production line moving, but Pawlick questioned whether the company should have just closed down.

“Topps makes Ring Pops and candy, is that truly essential?” he asked. “However, the company, in their defense, is complying with all the CDC recommendations.”

Ooms echoed his challenge on broadly defined essential businesses.

Distributors that ship food, cleaning products or medical supplies are obvious ones to keep open.

“Are handbags and shoes essential?” she asked. “There is a broader section of the workforce nationally that could be home if there were further breakdowns within the broader industry classifications.”

Pawlick said one of the largest companies where Local 229 represents workers, Americold Logistics in the Covington Industrial Park, which has about 240 workers, had only a handful of confirmed cases.

The transportation company has workers hauling “around the clock” to large cities in New York and New Jersey, he said.

“I think they’ve only had three employees through this test positive for COVID-19,” he said. “They’ve been kind of ahead of it. They immediately had those people removed from the building. They’re doing what they can.”

Contact the writer:

570-348-9131;

joconnell@timesshamrock.com;