The epidemic hot spots in Hai Duong at the end of January 2021, or Bac Ninh and Bac Giang during the ongoing epidemic are all provinces with many industrial zones with hundreds of thousands of workers.

Industrial parks are often located near residential areas, close to national highways, road systems, and vehicles spreading everywhere in the region and other provinces.

Late hours in front of Van Trung Industrial Park, March 2020.

Bac Giang has more than 240,000 workers working in 6 industrial parks in the province.

In four days from May 8 to May 14, Bac Giang detected 105 cases related to this outbreak.

On the afternoon of May 14, this province recorded 12 new cases of infection at Hosiden Vietnam Co., Ltd., which has 6,000 workers, in Quang Chau Industrial Park (Viet Yen).

Chairman of the People’s Committee of Bac Giang province Le Anh Duong said that although the outbreak is complicated, the main infections are in Shin Young Company.

CDC Bac Giang will take samples to test all 90,000 workers in Van Trung Industrial Park.

According to Mr. Duong, there will be more F0 cases related to the outbreak in the coming days.

The head of the Bac Giang government said that the Poyun story in Hai Duong earlier this year gave the province many lessons on preventing cross-infection in quarantine areas.

Van Trung Industrial Park workers wait for testing samples, May 14.

Bac Ninh on the night of May 11 reviewed and took samples of more than 5,000 workers in three industrial zones Que Vo, Yen Phong and Thuan Thanh II.

Previously, the province recorded two other cases of infection: workers of Samsung Electronics Vietnam Co., Ltd. (SEV) in Yen Phong Industrial Park.

Bac Ninh has more than 450,000 workers working in 10 industrial parks in the area.

Vice Chairman of the Provincial People’s Committee Vuong Quoc Tuan informed that the districts, through the community Covid team and the police, are still checking for workers staying in motels and in the area.

To both fight the epidemic and produce, many businesses divide into 3 to 4 working shifts per day, expanding the number of concentrated workers.

Provincial leaders believe that in the long term, vaccines are still the fundamental solution.

`Enterprises with many workers, economic potential, and wanting to stabilize production while the epidemic lasts will be willing to participate. If calculated, each worker who gets two full vaccinations will lose millions, but only needs one.

Despite the timely zoning and policy of widespread testing, according to the National Steering Committee for Covid-19 Prevention and Control, `the testing capacity of Bac Ninh and Bac Giang has not met the speed of sampling and tracing, causing the speed of testing to be faster.`

Medical staff took samples of workers at the Canon Company dormitory on the night of May 11.

According to Associate Professor, Dr. Tran Dac Phu, the outbreaks all occurred in industrial zones, such as Poyun in Hai Duong, or Shin Young in Bac Giang.

The Ministry of Health has issued guidelines for safe epidemic prevention in factories and industrial parks, by scoring and assessing risks.

In the factory, if possible, you should open the door and turn on the fan for maximum ventilation. Avoid turning on the air conditioner. Windows must be opened on vehicles transporting workers.

`Many places are not willing to prevent the disease before the risk. When a new outbreak appears, they run to suppress the epidemic or prevent it, it is too late,` he assessed.

According to Associate Professor Phu, if an outbreak occurs in an industrial park, it is necessary to first blockade and trace F1, focusing on testing all workshops or factories with positive cases.

`If you want to avoid disrupting the production chain, you can only strictly comply with epidemic prevention. Because if the epidemic spreads in the factory, the damage will be immeasurable,` he said.

The whole country has 369 concentrated industrial parks, nearly 30 border gate economic zones, export processing zones with about 3.8 million workers, in addition to 700 operating industrial clusters with about 600,000 workers.