Amazon has revealed that nearly 20,000 of its frontline workers in the US have contracted COVID-19 since March, after months of demands for public disclosure from activists.

Amazon said between March 1st and September 19th, 19,816 employees were confirmed to have contracted the coronavirus. That number equates to approximately 1.44% out of their roughly 1.37 million staffers at Amazon and Whole Foods Market.

Amazon has faced criticism and accusations of the company of putting employees’ health at risk by keeping warehouses open. Director of US activist group, Athena, Dania Rajendra, said in a statement: “Amazon allowed Covid-19 to spread like wildfire in its facilities, risking the health of tens of thousands of people who work at Amazon.”

But the online retailing company said its infection rate is lower than expected. In a blogpost, Amazon said that its analysis suggested that the rate of infection among workers at Amazon and Whole Foods was 42% lower than the rate expected based on the broader US population. It said that the company gives its employees comprehensive health insurance and paid time off for any worker who needs to be quarantined. It has also instituted new cleaning regimes and other processes to reduce the spread of the virus

The company said it has kept its facilities open throughout the pandemic to meet a surge in demand from shoppers stuck at home. The company said it was investing “hundreds of millions of dollars” in its own coronavirus testing programme. It plans to conduct 50,000 tests a day across 650 sites by November. 

The company said that it “introduced or changed over 150 processes”, distributed more than 100 million face masks, implemented temperature checks, introduced social distancing measures and additional cleaning, which “occurs across each site about every 90 minutes”.