The Ministry of Labor (MOL) on Tuesday revised its disease prevention guidelines, instructing companies with more than 30 migrant workers to appoint dedicated personnel to manage COVID-19 related matters, effective immediately.
However, the ministry is still drafting related rules and said it was aware that businesses might need time to adapt to the new rules.
The Workforce Development Agency said in a statement that businesses with more than 30 migrant workers must appoint COVID-19 prevention coordinators and other dedicated personnel to accelerate vaccinations, manage name registrations, disseminate disease prevention information and monitor workers’ health.
Photo: Lee Ya-wen, Liberty Times
If an employee at one of these businesses contracts COVID-19, the coordinator should be the contact person for health authorities and be the liaison with government agencies responsible for migrant workers, it said.
The coordinator should also list an infected worker’s contacts at the workplace and help determine places that worker might have visited, it said, adding that they would also have to comply with disease prevention protocols and assist health authorities in quarantining infected workers.
Regarding a ministry requirement that arriving migrant workers undergo mandatory quarantine at facilities provided by their brokers, the Workforce Development Agency said that the facility personnel must have a COVID-19 booster shot at least 14 days prior to starting work.
Personnel with a doctor’s certificate saying they should not be vaccinated against COVID-19 must undergo a self-paid rapid antigen test or a polymerase chain reaction test once a week, it said.
The prevention guidelines prohibit migrant workers from different companies from living in the same dormitory, it added.
The treatment of migrant workers during the COVID-19 pandemic has received much attention in the media, with reports highlighting differences between how migrant workers and Taiwanese are treated.
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