Washington, D.C.–As evidenced by the Ebola outbreak last year, infectious diseases continue to remain a constant threat and public health problem.

Cabin cleaners and wheelchair attendants in particular provide services that help minimize risks of possible contamination and provide services that protect travelers, other airport workers and the general public from possible infection. However, these contract workers, whose employers pay low wages that lead to high turnover in these jobs, often assume those critical responsibilities with little to no training from their employers and the airlines they serve.

To bring attention to their plight, more than 200 subcontracted cabin cleaners at LaGuardia Airport in New York City went on strike last October over unhealthy and unsafe working conditions, and to protest unfair labor practices. This toxic environment included lack of protection from possible exposure to Ebola and other infectious diseases.

“When I clean bathrooms, I come into contact with tampons, which I have to grab with my hand—with a glove that’s so cheap that it breaks easily,” Wendy Arellano, an Air Serv Cabin cleaner, told the Guardian while on strike last year. “I come into contact with feces, a lot of feces and vomit. And we have to clean those bathrooms spotless because they audit those planes.”

Fears among most Americans about the Ebola virus appear to have subsided. Nonetheless, airport terminal and cabin cleaners around the country say they still fear infectious diseases as they face the same hazards at work they did a year ago.

Because of the nature of their jobs, airport workers play a critical role in infection control efforts within the U.S. aviation system. SEIU is doing its part to ensure these workers are aware of the need for—and approaches to—infectious disease preparedness by providing health and safety trainings with added assistance of a grant from the Center for Disease Control and Prevention and the National Institute for Environmental Health Sciences, part of the National Institutes of Health.

SEIU kicked off the national infectious disease preparedness trainings in Los Angeles on Tuesday. The union joined the Labor Occupational Safety and Health at the University of California–Los Angeles and California’s Division of Occupational Safety and Health in Los Angeles to equip cabin cleaners, janitorial workers, baggage handlers, security officers and wheelchair attendants with the tools necessary to better tackle infectious diseases.

More than 70 employees participated in the training. Staff from U.S. Rep. Maxine Waters (D-Calif.) and Los Angeles Councilmember Mike Bonin’s offices attended the kick-off ceremony to show their support.

“The health and safety of everyone at the airport depends on well-trained employees, and I am very happy to see a partnership between airport contractors, Los Angeles World Airports and labor providing employees the knowledge they need to prevent public health issues before they become emergencies,” said Bonin, who represents Los Angeles International Airport and the neighborhoods around the airport.

The infectious disease prevention training at LAX is the first of a series of trainings to take place at airports across the country spearheaded by SEIU, due to a failure of responsibility by airports and airlines to ensure the contracted workforce is properly trained and receives wages in line with the critical role they play in ensuring passenger safety.

Airport workers are available for interviews. For more information, contact Marc Goumbri at marc.goumbri@seiu.org or 202.730.7269.

###

Airport workers across the country are coming together in Airport Workers United, a movement of workers and their allies, raising their voices for $15 and union rights to make our airports safe and secure for passengers, employees and our communities. Together, they have won a union voice for 15,000 airport workers and have already secured wage increases and other job improvements for more than 45,000 airport workers nationwide.

###