ST. LOUIS PARK, Minn. — A suburban Minneapolis nursing home has paid the state's largest fine for a coronavirus-related safety violation after an employee contracted COVID-19 and died.
State Labor Department inspection files show Sholom Community Alliance paid $27,100 in fines after David Kolleh died last May, the Star Tribune reported.
The St. Louis Park nursing home was cited for failing to provide an adequate respiratory program for workers. Inspectors for the Minnesota Occupational Safety and Health Administration determined the facility's failure "caused or contributed to" Kolleh's death.
But Sholom administrators dispute the conclusion that Kolleh caught the virus at work, and said management did everything possible to provide adequate protective gear to its hundreds of workers in the early days of the pandemic.
CEO Barbara Klick said no one knows how or when Kolleh contracted COVID-19, considering that he also worked in one other similar facility.
"We had an unknown, invisible enemy," she told the newspaper. "We had no way of knowing where it was. And we had little tools to fight it."
Minnesota health officials have reported nearly 570,000 COVID-19 cases since the pandemic began, and more than 7,000 coronavirus-related deaths, as of Sunday. So far, roughly 40% of the state's eligible population is fully vaccinated against the virus, totaling more than 1.7 million.
According to the Star Tribune, Kolleh was among the first 5,000 people in Minnesota to be diagnosed with COVID-19, and among the first 750 to die from its complications.
The 61-year-old Eagan resident was a husband and father of 13 children.
Meat producer JBS USA was also fined by Minnesota's Occupational Safety and Health Administration for worker deaths allegedly related to COVID-19, the Star Tribune reported. The company was issued two $25,000 penalties, and the cases are being contested.
