DHAKA - Migrant workers are a vital part of our country as they provide us with valuable remittances that have been boosting our economy for the past few decades.
However, as a nation, we have done little to recognise their contributions. In the last five decades, over 12 million Bangladeshis – nearly one million of them women – have gone abroad as migrant workers, sending back a total of US$275 billion (S$366 billion) in remittance earnings, according to the Bureau of Manpower Employment and Training.
However, many of them suffered terribly in the host countries as well as when they returned home, with little support offered by the state. Among them are those who returned with injuries or diseases which they received abroad.
Reportedly, even though the Wage Earners’ Welfare Board (WEWB) offers a variety of services to these workers, those are still quite insufficient. At the moment, the board gives them only 100,000 taka (S$1,270) as medical support, as well as the ambulance service to carry them from airports.
In many cases, however, injured migrants are not even aware of these services. From 2010 to January 2023, the WEWB distributed about 14.4 crore taka to 1,508 returnee migrant workers for treatment. In 2022, 383 of them received financial assistance – the most in a single year.
The Ovibashi Karmi Unnayan Programme (Okup), a migrant rights organisation, also offered medical assistance to 228 returnee migrant workers between 2019 and 2021.
There are a number of reasons behind the illnesses, injuries or deaths among our migrant workers abroad. Employers’ abusive and exploitative behaviour, occupational hazards and chronic diseases that develop over time abroad, among other things, cause their health to deteriorate, resulting in some cases in the collapse of their immune system.
Furthermore, their poor skill sets and lack of negotiating power prevent them from accessing basic health facilities or benefits. Okup has been requesting a unique social safety net system for injured and ill returnee migrants, but so far, to no avail.
If such a plan could be put in place, medical assistance can be provided under the plan until these workers fully recover.
Globally, several governments have taken the initiative to repatriate patients from host countries to ensure that they receive care in their own countries. Another strategy to ensure improved health is to provide health insurance systems.
Overseas Filipino workers, for example, pay for health insurance, which allows them to receive medical treatment when they return home. Bangladesh can follow a similar policy and make available services known to all migrant workers.
We must be more compassionate and proactive in the care of our migrant workers. That is the only way out for workers who are living a life of pain and misery.
The migrant workers have given so much to our country. It is high time we took better care of them. THE DAILY STAR/ASIA NEWS NETWORK
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