Digital platform drivers, such as Uber Eats, Amazon Flex, and Lyft drivers were busier than ever during the COVID-19 pandemic as the public attempted to avoid illness by ordering take-away food, shopping online and taking ride-hails rather than public transportation. This placed these courier workers in a unique position to become infected with COVID-19 and also transmit it to others as they moved people, food and packages from one location to another.
This CIHR-funded qualitative study examined how digital platform couriers in Ontario grasped and navigated COVID-19 risks and what approaches were taken by digital platform companies to protect the health of couriers. In-depth, semi-structured interviews were conducted in 2020-21 with 30 workers and 9 managers. Our situational data analysis approach involved constant comparison of data together with consideration of positionality of research participants and their contextual conditions. A Stakeholder Advisory Committee composed of senior community members, public health and occupational heath policy makers provided advice throughout the project.
In this session, I will share our findings regarding the five key COVID-19 related risks faced by the digital platform drivers and how drivers navigated them. We first describe driver’s constant encounters with customers in the course of their work, including delivering to people in quarantine. Next, we consider safety measures, including contactless delivery, taken by the apps to reduce courier’s exposure and ways that these had limited effectiveness. Third, we describe workers’ challenge of managing customers refusing to wear masks. The fourth risk addresses time-related pressures built into apps’ algorithms and enforced by the digital platform company’s rating systems that workers described as prompting them to take health risks. Finally, we describe the loss of income risk to workers of self-reporting COVID-19 symptoms to their apps. Finally, I will provide our suggestions for solutions.
Presenter: Ellen MacEachen
Ellen MacEachen is a professor in the School of Public Health Sciences at the University of Waterloo. Her research examines the changing nature of work with a focus on health, precarious employment and vulnerable workers. Her latest studies examine how digital platform and low wage workers are managing their health while navigating the COVID-19 environment. MacEachen’s 2019 edited book, “The Science and Politics of Work Disability Prevention” provides an international picture of social security systems, work and health. She works closely with community partners and policy makers to ensure research relevance and improve research impact. MacEachen sits on the Labour Market Information Expert Panel for the Labour Market Information Council of Canada (a federal advisory committee that provides independent advice on labour market policy and practice) and is past president of the Canadian Association for Research on Work and Health.
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