In Singapore, national spatial modelling exercises and containment measures missed to include the large migrant population as they simply did not consider it part of the inhabitants. The government was taken aback by the growing spread of the infection in migrants’ dormitories and implemented stay-at-home orders, despite activists arguing that such measures will continue to expose them to transmission due to the substandard living conditions.

In September, the dormitories, which house over 300,000 construction and shipbuilding workers in packed rooms that can hold up to 20 people, accounted for almost 95 percent of Singapore’s 57,000 infections. Though it is now decreasing, the number of daily infections in dormitories continue to outnumber those in the local communities.

In other destination countries, COVID-19 responses have also fallen short of protecting the workers and respecting their rights. In Malaysia, early in the epidemics, migrants and refugees were totally locked-down in settlements with no running water or isolation space and in great stress. And when the country started to reopen last May, they were subjected to immigration raids and arrests leading to a surge of infections in detention centers.

In Thailand, the hastily announced partial lockdown of Bangkok and border closure order in March triggered a mass exodus of migrants from Myanmar, Cambodia and Laos. Fearing being trapped in Thailand with no jobs and social protection, they took the risk of exposure in crowded transportation vehicles and border areas.

At the same time, workers in sectors exempted from lockdown such as construction were seen heading to work as usual in filled trucks with no social distancing and masks. A recent study found that last July, 57 percent of those interviewed were not provided basic personal protective equipment of masks and hand sanitizer by their employer – a figure higher than the already significant average of 33 percent for the region. Abuses have exacerbated, with greater pressure on migrants to take unpaid leave, refuse time off during the lockdown or being prevented from leaving by passport’s confiscation.

Sending countries have demanded migrant workers abroad not to return, but no bilateral arrangements have been made to enable this to happen. Vast numbers of Indonesian migrants had to return home from Malaysia, East Asia and the Middle East due to visa limitations and loss of employment, having to take risks along the way and experiencing stigmatization on arrival as the perceived “importer” of the disease.

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