WHAT: Press conference for the release of Blood, Sweat, and Fear: Workers' Rights in U.S. Meat and Poultry Plants

The report documents why meatpacking is the most dangerous factory job in the United States. Many workers suffer severe, life-threatening and sometimes life-ending injuries that are predictable and preventable. When workers attempt to address hazardous working conditions by forming unions and bargaining collectively, they are often spied on, harassed, pressured, threatened, suspended, fired, deported or victimized for exercising the freedom of association.

Report author Lance Compa and Human Rights Watch U.S. Program Director Jaime Fellner will discuss the report findings. David Bonior, the former U.S. Congressman who now serves as Board Chair of American Rights at Work, will comment on how U.S. labor law and its rapid erosion under the Bush Administration fails to protect workers who attempt to exercise their legal right to form unions. 

WHEN: 10:00 am, Tuesday, January 25, 2005

WHERE: Renaissance Chicago Hotel, 1 West Wacker Drive, Chicago, IL 60601

WHO: Human Rights Watch and American Rights at Work
 
Human Rights Watch monitors human rights developments worldwide and issues detailed reports for policymakers, international organizations, the media and the general public.

American Rights at Work is a nonprofit advocacy organization dedicated to educating the American public about the barriers that workers face when they attempt to exercise their rights to organize and engage in collective bargaining.