FOREIGN WORKERS (Preventive measures on spread of SARS)

Mdm Halimah Yacob asked the Minister for Manpower in view of the highly contagious nature of the SARS virus and bearing in mind the language and other difficulties faced by foreign workers and their living conditions, some of which may not have proper sanitation facilities (a) what measures are being taken including screening and education programmes to prevent the spread of SARS among foreign workers who are already working in Singapore; (b) will the intake of foreign workers from SARS-affected areas be tightened; and (c) if there is an outbreak of SARS among foreign workers what measures are in place to contain the spread of the disease.

The Minister for Manpower (Dr Lee Boon Yang): Mr Speaker, Sir, my Ministry has adopted a 2-pronged strategy to deal with the outbreak of SARS amongst the foreign worker population.

The first approach is to minimise the risk of infection by raising awareness within the existing foreign worker population in Singapore. My Ministry has been working with the Ministry of Health to prepare customised advisories to employers of foreign workers and to the foreign workers themselves, including the foreign domestic workers. Advisories to the foreign workers will be made available in their own languages.

In addition, officers from my Ministry have been briefing employers of foreign workers on the threat posed by SARS and some practical early detection in collaboration with the various employer and industry associations.

Sir, the fight against SARS requires the total involvement of employers and employees. Both employers and employees, whether they are Singaporeans or foreigners, must take proactive steps to minimise the chances of an outbreak of SARS at the workplace.

The Ministerial Committee on SARS has also studied and prepared contingency plans to deal with an outbreak of SARS among large numbers of foreign workers. So far, this has not happened. The plan would include setting up quarantine facilities to isolate affected workers in designated areas.

Sir, the second approach is aimed at minimising the import of new SARS cases via the intake of foreign workers from SARS-affected areas. In this regard, companies have been strongly urged to defer bringing in new work pass holders from SARS-affected areas, and to refrain from sending existing work pass holders or their other employees to SARS-affected areas for the time being. Where it is absolutely necessary to do so, employers must place the work pass holders under mandatory quarantine for a minimum of 10 days immediately upon arrival in Singapore. Work permit holders will be placed under quarantine at designated dormitories while employment pass holders will be placed under home quarantine.

To assist employers during this difficult time, my Ministry will exercise flexibility in renewing or extending work permits of existing workers in Singapore coming from the SARS-affected areas beyond the usual maximum period of stay. The other prevailing work permit conditions will continue to apply to such renewal or extension. This would reduce the need for employers to bring in new foreign workers from the SARS-affected areas.

Mdm Halimah Yacob (Jurong): Sir, since 11th April 2003, special quarantine measures have been imposed on foreign workers coming to work in Singapore. Can the Minister give us an update on those measures?

Dr Lee Boon Yang: Mr Speaker, Sir, we have introduced this quarantine requirement on new arrivals on work passes, and also existing work pass holders who have been back to SARS-affected areas since 11th April 2003. Since then, we have had several batches of work permit holders and groups of employment pass holders coming into Singapore.

At one of our dormitories used for quarantining the work permit holders in Tampines, we had two groups coming in since 10th April actually. A total of 93 work permit holders were quarantined at the Tampines dormitory, out of which 79 had successfully completed their quarantine. They had shown no signs of fever during the 10 days, and they were released back to their employers to start work. Eight of the second batch of 53 developed fever during their stay and had to be sent to Tan Tock Seng Hospital for further observation. Fortunately, to-date, none has been diagnosed as suspected SARS cases. Most of them have been released but, arising from having eight workers to be sent to Tan Tock Seng Hospital, we have had to make further arrangements to re-isolate those who were discharged from Tan Tock Seng Hospital. As of now, there is still one work permit holder who is at Tan Tock Seng Hospital under observation.

At the Woodlands dormitory, we had 89 work permit holders under quarantine, mostly existing work permit holders who had been on home leave from their employers and who were coming back to Singapore. Fortunately, all of them are well; none of them has shown any sign of fever during this period.

A total of 126 current Employment Pass holders had returned to Singapore from SARS-affected areas since the quarantine requirement was implemented. So far, 15 had completed their period of quarantine yesterday. Two of those who were expected to complete their quarantine period yesterday had, during that period, left Singapore. We are following up with them and will take up their cases upon their return. 33 new Employment Pass holders had also completed their home quarantine and were certified fit. The doctors gave them a medical certificate to say that they had no fever, they were certified fit to commence work. They were issued with new Employment Passes accordingly. Two of the applicants were not issued with Employment Passes and were asked to submit the required medical certificates before the Employment Passes could be issued. Their employers were also warned to comply with the quarantine requirements.

Arising from this experience of running a quarantine for newly-arrived work permit or Employment Pass holders, we have to revise some of our procedures, particularly those concerning the work permit holders, as a result of which we have had to ask employers to slow down their intake of new work permit holders for the time being, especially those coming from the SARS-affected areas. We need to look for more facilities, more accommodation to put them up. In case they have to be sent to Tan Tock Seng Hospital for observation, upon their discharge from the hospitals, we would have to find better isolation facilities to accommodate them so that they are not mixed together with any of the other work permit holders who are under quarantine. Because, if they are mixed together, then it will complicate the quarantine for the rest of the work permit holders. They will end up having to stay for a longer period, as we have experienced in one instance in Tampines.

Hence, we are seeking the cooperation of employers. We ask them to please defer bringing in new workers for a period of time. Let us look for more and better accommodation that can meet the needs of this quarantine before we can allow them to bring in the work permit holders from these SARS-affected areas. The purpose is not to prevent them from recruiting the work permit holders if they really need them, but it is just to allow us more time to set up a better system to handle the new arrivals.

Ms Braema Mathiaparanam (Nominated Member): Sir, the Minister spoke about language translations. I would like to know the number of languages it has been translated into and whether these are ready. What is the current capacity for quarantine?

Dr Lee Boon Yang: We will prepare the advisories in all the languages of the foreign workers who are in Singapore. Of course, for Employment Pass holders, language is not a problem. They are all better educated. English is their lingua franca. For the foreign domestic workers, they would be in Bahasa Indonesia, Tagalog and Thai. For the construction workers, they would be in Thai and Tamil. For those from Bangladesh, we will have them in Bangladeshi. Whatever it is, we will have them in the language that they are familiar with.

As to her second question on accommodation capacity that we have today for the work permit holders, we have sufficient capacity for about 200 work permit holders in a centralised quarantine at any one time. But because of the complication that once a batch comes in and somebody has to be sent to Tan Tock Seng Hospital for observation and, when he is discharged, he cannot go back to the same group, he has to be kept separate for a further period of observation. So, if we have a number of such cases - as I explained earlier on, we have eight out of the second batch of 53 - then we complicate the process and we increase the demand for accommodation. That is why we are now in the process of looking for more and better-suited accommodation, and we are requesting employers to please, in the meantime, slow down the intake, to give us time to look for these facilities.

Ms Braema Mathiaparanam: Could the Minister please let us know when these translations will be available, because the foreign workers are already at the doorsteps of hospitals?

Dr Lee Boon Yang: I believe my Ministry has got the translations ready, and most of them would be in the process of being issued. The whole list of guidelines is in this folder, and all that is required to be translated would be made and released as soon as possible.

Dr Wang Kai Yuen (Bukit Timah): I would like to ask the Minister whether the Government would differentiate the usage of the terms "SARS-affected areas" and "SARS-affected countries", in particular, in relation to large countries like Canada and China.

Dr Lee Boon Yang: Mr Speaker, Sir, SARS-affected areas are all those that are listed by the WHO. In the context of a big country like China, any work permit holder or Employment Pass holder coming from China, regardless of which point of departure, will be treated the same way.