Workers walk out of iPhone factory, highlighting virus woes

BEIJING (AP) — Workers who assemble Apple Inc.’s newest iPhone walked away from a factory in central China following virus outbreaks and complaints of unsafe working conditions, highlighting the clash between the disease’s enduring risks and efforts to restore the global flow of goods.

Employees started leaving the Foxconn factory in Zhengzhou after some fell ill in mid-October and received no treatment, according to an employee who asked not to be identified by name. He said Foxconn has begun requiring face masks and disinfects the workplace daily but work continues normally.

“There are still people getting infected at the assembly lines, and they are still worried about going to work,” the employee said Monday by phone from Zhengzhou. He said he had left the factory and planned to return to his hometown.

As other countries ease anti-virus curbs, exporters in China are trying to fill orders while coping with a “Zero COVID” strategy that abruptly shuts down cities for a week or longer to contain outbreaks.

In a statement, Foxconn said it is using “closed-loop management” in Zhengzhou, an official term for having employees live in their workplace with no outside contact. The company said it was providing three meals a day. It did not say when those measures began.

Foxconn, also known as Hon Hai Precision Electronics Inc., didn’t respond to questions about how many employees were infected, whether new cases were occurring or to complaints that people who were sick in early October received no treatment.

The activist group China Labor Watch said Foxconn was under pressure from Apple to maintain its output of the iPhone 14 during its “peak production season.” It said the factory in Zhengzhou, with 90 assembly lines, is the main iPhone assembly site.

Apple didn’t respond...