‘Soap and solace scarce as Sri Lanka’s tea pickers toil on amid lockdown’

Sri Lanka’s tea plantation workers “with a history of exploitation face hazards including a lack of masks and overcrowded accommodation,” despite tough lockdown measures across the island, Yasmin Gunaratnam writes for The Guardian . “A caveat on the country’s lockdown order, issued on 20 March, read: ‘Paddy farming and plantation, including work on tea small holdings and fishing activities, are permitted in any district,’” she wrote. “The Ceylon Worker’s Red Flag Union say coronavirus public health measures mean little on estates, There are no facilities to wash hands with soap during a shift...