The outbreak of the COVID-19 epidemic coincided with the Spring Festival. After the holiday, nearly 300 million migrant workers, mostly from central and western China, would return to cities in the east.
Mainly employed in sectors of manufacturing, services or construction, they are very important for the economy of China and the world. How does China make sure these people'safe return to work?
BEIJING, Feb. 28 (Xinhua) -- As the COVID-19 epidemic is still going on, China has to make sure its nearly 300 million migrant workers return to work safely. What kind of prevention and control measures have been taken?
They have to go through stringent health check before getting on board for their trip. This is why most of China's four million grass-roots medics have been sent to stations, airports and highway entrances.
Quarantine zones have been reserved on trains and planes to isolate passengers with fever.
Under a rigorous tracking system, if one passenger is confirmed or suspected of being infected with the virus, people on the same vehicle will be quickly tracked down.
To avoid further risk of infection during the trip, authorities advocate "one-stop" service that takes passengers directly to the destination without stopping halfway.
Vehicles will be disinfected before departure, during the journey and on arrival. In principle, attendance of long-distance buses can not exceed 50 percent.
If the attendance rate turns out to be high, larger planes will be used or more flights will be added to ensure passengers can be scattered properly and there is room for quarantine.
In Zhejiang and Fujian provinces, governments booked chartered flights to bring workers back, spending over 70,000 U.S. dollars each flight.
After arriving at the work city, local governments will arrange vehicles to pick up the workers. Most of them need to be quarantined 14 days at home to make sure the infected ones do not go to work.
The central and local governments have spared no efforts to encourage companies to bring workers back to work safely and quickly.
In Sanya, Hainan province, the government offers an employer over 140 U.S. dollars of subsidies for every construction worker returning to work. In Yiwu, Zhejiang province, bus or train tickets will be fully reimbursed.
Now, about 10 million workers are on their way back to work each day, and these people's move has not caused spread of the epidemic.
The number of new confirmed cases of coronavirus infection is declining.
It is estimated that another 100 million workers will return to work starting early March. Meanwhile, prevention and control measures will be stepped up. This is how China combats the coronavirus. ■
Director: Shan Xu
Executive Director: Feng Chun, Zhang Xiaoxue, Wang Ting, Guan Hongfei
Coordination: Yang Guang, Liu Pei
Production: Li Dongze, Jiang Yudong, Shang Junwei
Visual Design: Guo Chao, Wang Jiadong
Script: Xia Kangjing, Helen Bentley
Voiceover: Bluiris