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General Electric Factory Workers Stage Protest, Demanding Ventilator Production

Aviation factory workers are demanding that the company cease its jet engine production and instead make life-saving ventilators amid the COVID-19 crisis.

General Electric factory workers protested on Monday for the company’s reluctance to cease jet engine production to make ventilators amid the coronavirus pandemic, Vice reported. Factory workers protested at the company’s Lynn, Massachusetts, aviation facility, and the company’s Boston headquarters, calling on General Electric to convert its aviation facility into a site for ventilator production to save lives. The company already has a health-care division that manufactures ventilators at a mass scale. “Most Americans are not aware that the best ventilators are already made by General Electric within the company’s healthcare division,” said CWA President Chris Shelton. Just last week, General Electric laid off nearly 2,600 workers and “temporarily” laid off 50 percent of its maintenance staff. “If GE trusts us to build, maintain, and test engines which go on a variety of aircraft where millions of lives are at stake, why wouldn’t they trust us to build ventilators?” said IUE-CWA Local President Jake Aguanaga.