This week there has been a lot of vitriol thrown towards Auckland’s positive COVID-19 cases, most of which aimed at one young KFC worker. 

Firstly, I’m a 31-year-old who came of age during the technological revolution which gave rise to social media. 

People of my age developed it and gave it to the world. Now, many of us have grown to hate it. 

Not only is it a waste of time, mindlessly scrolling feeds perfectly curated by individuals to show the best of their lives and hide any hint of unhappiness, but it is used to peddle misinformation and hatred. 

This week, the young KFC worker, who was asymptomatic and did not know they had COVID, went into work. 

Chicken was not the only thing cooked, as they were roasted online, with abuse hurled at them at shocking levels. 

I won’t repeat anything communicated, but I just want to argue this kind of thing does absolutely no good, and in fact, makes it worse. 

This is the second time from memory that this situation has happened. Last year the young retail worker in Auckland was forced to go into work despite calling in sick. It sparked the first Auckland Alert Level 3 lockdown. 

It could be argued such abuse makes people who are contacts to confirmed cases even more afraid to come forward or admit they were a contact, for fear of retaliation. 

As soon as COVID arrived I wrote an opinion piece about self-isolating and how many people in the workforce simply cannot afford to not go to work. 

I think this also plays a part and it is two-fold. 

For one, those workers in industries such as hospitality and retail are usually young and work on casual contracts. Meaning, if they don’t work, they don’t get paid. 

Two weeks isolation would become a matter of not having enough money to eat. 

The second is the employers, who usually run a tight ship on skeleton crew. 

When I was younger and worked in retail on any spare hour away from university, I was usually by myself manning the counter of a shop, or one of two people. 

On numerous occasions (well before COVID), I would call in sick only to be abused or guilted into coming into work. 

One boss told me, while I had the flu, that I had to find myself a replacement or simply be removed from the roster (fired, essentially). I couldn’t find any willing replacements so I went into work sick. 

Those kind of employers need to be held accountable. 

On the flipside, I do understand there are employees who cry wolf, but an employer running of ship of young casual workers should expect that and have a flexible roster of employees.

I feel this KFC employee was between a rock and a hard place - stay home and self-isolate, not get paid, not afford food or repay debts, and maybe risk their job, or go to work. 

I am definitely not defending them absolutely, I am just arguing that a degree of sympathy needs to be reserved. 

Keyboard warriors don’t know the full story, haven’t lived in this person’s shoes, and simply don’t have the right to abuse somebody. 

If we are to keep COVID-19 at bay, then I believe the Government, employers and society needs to look at the nature of industries such as retail and hospitality, and work out a better system to avoid sick workers having to go into work, or worse, hide their illness.