MONTREAL -- The union that represents health-care workers in Montreal announced that one of its frontline staff, a man in his mid-forties, has died due to COVID-19.

The Federation de la sante et des services sociaux (FSSS-CSN) announced on its Facebook page that one of its personnel in downtown Montreal working at an infected long-term care facility died.

“It is the whole network staff who are grieving,” the message reads. “We would like to salute the memory of this agent, who came to help in the red zones infected with the coronavirus in CHSLDs ....Losing your life at work should never happen, and this tragedy shows the risks we take every day with COVID-19,” the message concludes.

The staff member was a father who had over five years of experience working at the Yvon-Brunet and Manoir Verdun long-term care facilities (CHSLDs), residences in the south central region of health and social services with known outbreaks of the virus.

“He had worked in hot zones, and we know that his death was caused by a COVID-19 infection” said Hubert Forcier, a spokesperson for FSSS-CSN. “Our deepest sympathies go out to his family.”