And in many instances, the work was hazardous. Other forms of business moved online, but “in the hospitality industry, for instance, it"s very hard to replace somebody who"s at the reception desk of a hotel with somebody who"s working virtually”, says Serge da Motta Veiga, professor of human resource management at EDHEC Business School in Paris. That meant frontline service workers, forced to interact with colleagues and customers while everyone else was sheltering at home, were among the most vulnerable to Covid-19. In the first year of the pandemic, 68% of working-age adults who died in the US were labour, retail and service workers.