Mexico auto plants to reopen as country weighs virus risks

MEXICO CITY (AP) — On a day Mexico saw its worst daily increase yet in coronavirus cases, foreign-owned auto plants began setting dates for reopening.

Volkswagen de Mexico said late Thursday it is planning to reopen its assembly plant in Puebla state and its engine factory in Guanajuato state on June 1.

General Motors said it hadn’t fixed “an exact date” for reopening its plant, also in the Guanajuato city of Silao, but some workers there reported getting notices to report for work on May 18.

Toyota, Nissan and Ford did not immediately respond to requests for comment on possible re-openings of their plants in Mexico.

Pressure is growing both domestically and from the United States for Mexico to re-open manufacturing activities, something President Andrés Manuel López Obrador says could happen by May 17 in areas of the country that haven’t been hit hard by the virus.

Mexico has lost about 500,000 jobs because of the pandemic lockdown, and small store owners wrote a public letter to López Obrador on Wednesday complaining they can't get stocks of basic supplies because hundreds of towns in Mexico have closed themselves off for fear of contagion.

In late March, the U.S. government launched a campaign to get Mexico to reopen assembly plants, suggesting the supply chain of the North American free trade zone could be permanently affected if they didn’t resume production. Mexico has said it is working on a joint plan with the U.S. and Canada to reopen factories, especially auto plants.

But the dangers of re-opening are evident. On Thursday, Mexico reported its largest one-day increase so far in confirmed coronavirus cases, with almost 2,000 new infections nationwide — a 7.2% increase compared from Wednesday's rise. Total deaths neared the 3,000 mark.

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