Freer rest days some way off amid new infections

It was a rainy night last Saturday, and Terusan Recreation Centre in Jurong was buzzing with activity.

Migrant workers were spotted making a beeline for a row of shops at the centre, leaving with bulging bags of fresh produce or sporting new haircuts.

In the beer garden, many relaxed over cans of Kingfisher and Kalyani Black Label, popular brands of Indian beer. Others drifted towards the football pitch, where a four-on-four game - the largest currently allowed under Singapore's safe distancing measures - was under way.

Recreation centres such as Terusan are the only places, apart from workplaces and dormitories, that migrant workers have been allowed to gather at since the Covid-19 pandemic hit.

To qualify for visits to one of the eight recreation centres, workers must have immunity to Covid-19 and have tested negative during rostered routine testing.

They must then book exit passes for permission to visit their assigned centres, which have quotas on the number of workers allowed to visit. Each visit lasts four hours, with migrant workers allowed to make three visits a week.

Plans were being drawn up to allow workers to return to the community once a month, Second Minister for Manpower Tan See Leng had said last month in the debate on his ministry's budget.

But with 17 recovered workers testing positive for the coronavirus at Westlite Woodlands dormitory earlier this week - raising fears of possible re-infection - any further easing of the current strict restrictions looks set to be some way off.

"Before Covid-19, we used to play on the grounds of the Chinese Garden. We used to travel to places like Mustafa Centre and meet friends," shipyard worker Mohammad Imam Hossain told Insight last Saturday.

The Bangladeshi said his overall experiences have been good so far, but he hopes that things will return to normal soon.

"Of course, we want to return to a healthy life," he said.

Restrictions on the more than 300,000 migrant workers living in dormitories here were introduced following a surge in Covid-19 cases last April. These rules were gradually eased towards the end of last year as cases subsided, allowing workers to use communal cooking facilities within dorms and visit recreation centres.

Migrant worker organisations say that although many workers are grateful that they have been able to resume work, some are also feeling the stress of being cooped up for an extended period.

For instance, some workers are frustrated that they have not been able to visit places they previously frequented, such as shopping areas or parks, said Ms Yvonne Loo, manager of outreach and engagements at non-profit organisation HealthServe.

Mr Ethan Guo, general manager of Transient Workers Count Too, said that although the workers are typically reluctant to talk about mental health issues, the topic has come up more frequently over the past year.

"We started seeing a lot of things like adjustment issues with workers who were not able to cope with being confined for long durations, and workers who couldn't stand it and wanted to go home," he said.

Even visits to recreation centres can be a stressful experience.

Ms Dipa Swaminathan, who founded non-profit organisation ItsRainingRaincoats, said workers sometimes queue for a long time to leave their dorms and to enter recreation centres, which eats into their leisure time.

But she added that for the vast majority of workers, earning enough money to send home is their main priority.

"They would rather endure the restrictions and go to work, than have no restrictions and no work," she said, adding that workers typically do not grumble about their current situation.

"Their main goal is... to earn a living, and they are happy as long as they are treated fairly. They are not here to get a free ride, to cause trouble, or to complain and whine."

The question remains: How soon should restrictions on migrant workers be eased, allowing them to return to the wider community?

Once they have been vaccinated or reached immunity through natural infection, workers should be subject to the same rules as the wider community, said Associate Professor Alex Cook, vice-dean of research at the National University of Singapore's Saw Swee Hock School of Public Health.

These include standard safe management measures and stay-home notices if they are found to be close contacts of a case, as well as mandatory carrying of a TraceTogether token, in addition to continued rostered routine testing.

Added Prof Cook, who is also the school's domain leader for biostatistics and modelling: "Until the current cluster, we've had hardly any infections in the dorms for the last six months. Once vaccination has been rolled out, I find it hard to justify the continuing restrictions to their freedoms."