Taipei, Dec. 9 (CNA) Migrant factory workers arriving from Vietnam and Thailand will now be required to have a COVID-19 test at the end of their mandatory 14-day quarantine, the Central Epidemic Command Center (CECC) said Wednesday.
The CECC said it will cover the costs of the tests at designated hospitals in Taiwan, while the employers and labor brokers will be responsible for the transportation arrangements.
With the new regulation set to take effect Thursday, it means that all migrant workers arriving in Taiwan, with the exception of fishermen and those from Malaysia, will be tested for COVID-19.
Currently, all arriving migrant caregivers, as well as other workers from the Philippines and Indonesia, are required to quarantine for 14 days at government designated centers and are tested for COVID-19 a few days before their quarantine ends, according to the CECC.
As of the end of October, there were 701,240 migrant workers in Taiwan, 264,984 of whom were from Indonesia, 228,433 from Vietnam, 151,071 from the Philippines, 56,743 from Thailand, and eight from Malaysia, according to government data.
