|
REPORTS
|
|
|
Report on
the Effect of SARS on Workers in China
Summer
2003
By China
Labor Watch, Anthony B Cino
Table of Contents
Summary
Introduction
Macro
Effects of SARS on the Chinese Worker
Fear
and the Handling of Information
Punishing
the Rumors
Factory
and Government Policies, Workers without a Voice
The
Difficulties Faced by Migrant Labor
Legal
Methods of Enforcement
Conclusion
Summary:
Workers were dramatically affected by the
advent of Severe Acute Respiratory Syndrome (SARS) in China. The
plight of workers in China during SARS is best described as one of powerlessness. China was affected on a macro-level to a degree
which is still being determined, but which caused many businesses to flee China in favor of other locations, or for
business to be slowed down until the situation improved. These events have affected employment,
security, and wages of workers. On a
more local level, as SARS developed into an epidemic, laws were put in place to
prevent the spread of the disease and allegedly to protect the workers. This resulted in the temporary closing of
factories and the quarantining of others while work continued. Workers were not provided with the most
current information on what was going on and were not given a say in their own
lives. China Labor Watch understands the
difficulty of the situation put before the government and the people of China,
and commends those that did their most to prevent the spread of the disease and
provide current and accurate information to the public, but especially to those
that had the best interest of the workers in mind. The following is the result of an
investigation in China by Chinese researchers as well as an intensive monitoring and review
of local and international government and media reports on developments
throughout China and in specific regions.
Introduction
The
end of 2002 saw the beginning of a new epidemic that spread throughout the
beginning of 2003 and killed hundreds, sickened thousands, and frightened and
otherwise affected millions or billions.
Perhaps nowhere was this felt more acutely than in China. China Labor Watch initiated an investigation
of the impact Severe Acute Respiratory Syndrome (SARS) has had on workers. As the disease came to an end, China Labor
Watch continued the investigation and has sought to include other sources of
information to obtain a better overall picture of the situation and to
understand what was and was not done to protect workers. We have found that the main effect on workers
was one of disempowerment. Because of
the illegality of independent representative unions, workers had no one to act
on their behalf to make sure their concerns, needs and best interests were
being looked after.
Macro Effects of SARS on the Chinese
Workers
The
effect of SARS on the Chinese economy has been substantial. Although it now appears that China’s
growth in its second quarter will be higher than had been previously expected,
there is no doubt that SARS slowed down the Chinese economy during this
time. China’s
economy actually grew by 9.9 percent in the first three months of this year –
its fastest quarterly growth in years.[i] This was largely due to the fact that SARS
was not the global threat that it was later perceived to be, and also that
Chinese companies were still covering orders that were placed before SARS
struck. However, second quarter GDP
dropped to 6.7 percent growth for a total 8.2 percent growth rate for the first
half of the year.[ii] This slowdown in development was in many ways
caused by the impact of SARS , for example many companies went to other
countries for their supplies and products, were forced to delay business
ventures, and often times closing factories when it was suspected that SARS may be present. All of these in turn have had a serious
effect on workers.
Because
of SARS, foreign companies delayed launching new projects, starting new
ventures or opening new factories that they had planned for China. Others have shifted business from China
to other countries for fear of how SARS would affect their businesses. China’s
textile exports were hurt by the SARS epidemic as overseas orders began
shifting to competitors such as India,
Pakistan, and Turkey.[iii] Reports have shown that apparel exports in India
grew by almost 14% in the first four months of the year, largely because of
business that left from China
due to SARS.[iv]
The
Associated Press reported that “foreign companies, heeding advisories not to
travel to the mainland, are putting off launching new products, opening new
factories or starting new joint ventures.”[v] One paper reported, “In Japan, a major
investor in China,
a survey of 2,015 companies by the Japan External Trade Organization found that
70 percent said SARS was affecting operations.
Three quarters said business negotiations stalled, while one-third said
they suspended production because of limits on travel by their staff, according
to the agency.”[vi] Companies such as Sumitomo and Dowa Mining
Co. postponed ventures in China
until things cleared up.[vii]
The economy
has been affected as businesspeople avoided China
and the need to take precautions within the country interfered with work and
deliveries. “The production system is
seriously affected. Goods, materials and
supplies are not being delivered,” says Chen Xingdong,
chief economist in Beijing for BNP
Paribas Peregrine Securities Ltd. “These
problems will surface more in June, July or even August,” Chen said. [viii]
According
to Henry Huang, manager of public and government affairs for ASIMCO, his
company has been hindered by SARS at every turn. This American company, which
has joint ventures in China’s
beer and auto parts industries has encountered a variety of problems: “Delivery
people sometimes cannot send goods to certain areas,” says Huang. “Some markets for components are half-closed,
some totally closed. It’s affected some
deliveries and some sales, bit it’s not like a fatal problem. [ix]
There
were many reports of factory and office building closures due to SARS. In Beijing,
the Beijing Matsushita Color CRT Co., which employs 5,200 people producing
television picture tubes,[x]
and Beijing Matsushita Lighting Co., which employs 400 were closed down,
keeping the nearly 6000 workers at home because a Chinese employees fell ill
with SARS.[xi] Ricoh Electronics Technology, a major
Japanese office equipment maker, also had to close a Beijing
factory from May 5 to May 11 after a 25 year-old employee came down with
SARS. Ricoh provided the rest of the
workers at the factory with masks, disinfected work spaces every day, and
provided company buses so that its workers could avoid using public transport
for commuting.[xii] U.S.
mobile phone maker Motorola briefly closed its 18 story Beijing
offices because the company’s 33 year old project manager had contracted SARS. Approximately 1000 personnel were affected as
they were unable to work at the building, from home, or from the Motorola’s
other office in West Beijing. Many other multinational corporations have
already sent employees out of the city and back to their home countries.
The
Macroeconomic effects of SARS were significant, but limited. They indirectly affected workers throughout China
by denying them work opportunities that would have been available to them.
Given this situation, CLW sought to understand what circumstances workers found
themselves in after SARS hit, how the epidemic was handled, and any impact it
had on the lives of workers in China.
Fear and the Handling of Information
Government
handling of information about SARS led to much fear and misunderstanding among
workers. Like many in China,
workers were concerned for their safety and health and wanted good information
on the situation so that they could make well informed decisions on what was
best for them and their families. After
initially covering the epidemic up, Beijing Mayor Meng
Xuenong was fired [xiii]and
the nation’s health minister Wenkang and then
admitted that the SARS cases were actually 10 times what had been previously
thought. This caused a lot of fear,
especially in Beijing, and
precipitated an exodus of laborers trying to flea the city to protect their
health.[xiv] Reporting on this same time period, Newsweek
reported that “Posters in Beijing’s
Sahoyaoju neighborhood announced that by municipal
orders, ‘floating people’ must ‘leave the city for some time,’ and those who
fail to depart will meet with police action.
In contrast the General Office of the State Council, China’s
cabinet, officially told college students and migrant workers not to leave,
fearing the estimated 750,000 ‘floating people’ and thousands of students would
carry the virus home.”[xv]
These
kinds of conflicting policies and contradictory information fueled a feeling of
helplessness among workers and an increased desire for information. Many tried to protect themselves from SARS by
leaving the cities that were the hotspots of the epidemic, in spite of the
Chinese Cabinet’s adopted policy of ordering municipal governments and
employers not to fire migrant laborers or send them home. As was reported in one paper, the policy made
little difference to some. The paper
quoted one worker as saying, “Our boss said we weren’t allowed to leave, but he
didn’t discuss who would pay our medical fees if we got sick… We were afraid of
getting SARS so we quit.”[xvi]
Punishing the Rumors
In
such an environment, the desire for accurate information is enormous. When accurate information is not available,
people look for any information that is available. This is human nature and was the case with
workers in China
during the epidemic. Authorities in China
have sought to control information about SARS so that people would not be given
misinformation that may lead to panic or further spreading of the disease. One result of this practice has been the
persecution of some workers who passed on information they believed to be
true.
One
example from Chinese media relates that an employee of an electronics factory
in Dongguan City, Guangdong province named Peng Mo received an email regarding “Atypical Pneumonia”
that said: “Qingxi’s Samsung electronics factory has
already had one person die of SARS, Dongguan health
bureau has already sent people to come investigate the factory. 20 people are already suspected of having
contracted the virus, and have been taken to Dongguan
city. Reputedly, the illness originated
with a staff worker at the Samsung factory in Hong Kong
where workers have almost all been put on forced vacation...” After reading the email and believing it to
be true, Peng Mo
passed the email onto 40 other employees.
However, after authorities in Dongguan
verified that the letter was fabricated, Peng Mo was
dismissed by his employer and two days later was arrested by the authorities.[xvii]
On
May 15, 2003 it was announced by PRC state media that the Supreme People’s
Court had laid down new standards that made it so people who spread rumors
about SARS or violated quarantine orders could face long prison sentences. Xinhua news agency
quoted a court circular as saying those convicted of intentionally spreading
rumors could be jailed for up to five years.
According to China News Service, by the end of May, Chinese police had
detained at least 107 people in a crackdown on SARS-related rumors, of which at
least 12 were arrested and formally charged and 33 other were placed in
detention.[xviii]
Factory and Government Policies, Workers
without a Voice
Besides
the indirect effects of losing opportunities for work because of the overall
economic environment in China,
as wellas the psychological effects of fear, workers
were directly impacted in very serious and frightening ways on a daily
basis. China Labor Watch conducted an
investigation into the situation of several foreign factories in the regions of
South East China surrounding Dongguan and Shenzhen
cities. There are three factories that
were focused on because their experiences are representative of the greater
number of factories investigated by CLW.
The examples that we will cite here are: Dongguan
??Meida Electonics Products
Factory which produces medical and toy products and employs 3000 people, Dongguan City Changan Shili Electronics Factory which primarily produces computer
components and employs 8000 people, and Shenzhen Nantai
Electronics Product Factory which produces computer components and employs 6000
people. In total, 50,000 people are
employed at the factories where China Labor Watch conducted its
investigations.
Positive Changes and Steps
There
are several changes that came to the factories after SARS that can be seen as
being positive. According to China Labor
Watch’s investigation of the YuAn area of Shenzhen
City and of 10 factories in Dongguan, workspaces, dormitories and eating areas were
being cleaned and disinfected, and inspections were carried out to make sure
sanitation policies were being observed.
These are new policies that were not in effect before the SARS
outbreak. CLW has also observed that the
food in the cafeteria was more sanitary than before. China Labor Watch does not expect that this
will continue far into the future, as the memory of SARS fades. Changes in the cleanliness of factories and
the sanitary environment for preparing food are important, but workers have
little voice in maintaining these improvements.
Every
local government of Guangdong
fortified their SARS inspection centers.
When workers took the public busses they were required to have their
temperatures taken. From March until
May, when China Labor Watch’s investigators were performing their research in
the area, they were asked to show credentials and had their temperatures
taken. On April 25th the
researchers discovered that someone in the Zhuhai
station was not allowed to board a bus, due to the fact that he was suspected
of having SARS.
Without a Voice
Before
April, if there was a worker who came down with a relatively serious cold, the
factory would force the worker to leave the factory to rest, and would not
provide any money to help with treatment.
One example which China Labor Watch had heard about was a worker who was
suspected of having SARS being forced to leave the factory to rest. The factory did not support the worker with
money for medical treatment but took the worker to a train station and put the
worker on a train to Guizhou. China Labor Watch suspects that this worker
was not able to get treatment in time and died sometime after leaving the
factory.
There
have been two changes in the treatment of suspected SARS cases after
April. Before April, factories would
force workers suspected of having SARS to leave the factory and pay for medical
attention themselves. Later on the
policy changed so that when a factory suspected a worker of having SARS, the
local government would not permit factory workers to leave the factory, and
would also not allow any of the workers of factories in the area to leave.
For
example, according to a China Labor Watch investigation, Shenzhen Nantai Electronics Factory on April 28th stopped
letting its workers leave the factory because one worker was suspected of
having SARS. The workers were forced to stay
in the factory for 14 days, after which the workers in the area around this
factory were quarantined in the same way and not permitted to leave their
factories. The policy was strictly
enforced for the average worker that had no way of having his or her voice
being heard. This is contrasted with
some high level managers that did not have to abide by the quarantine and were
able to leave the factories to go home to their families. The workers, having fewer resources available
to them were at the mercy of the government and factory management.
As
stated above, in the period between March 20th and May 20th,
if a worker became ill with a fever the worker was forbidden to leave their
factory. According to our investigation,
in early May ten factories in the area of Shenzhen Nantai
Electronics Factory stopped allowing their employees to leave the factories
because a worker in Shenzhen Nantai Electronics
Factory was suspected of having SARS.
The policy here was not to close the factory and cease operations, but
rather prevent employees from leaving, as work at the factory continued
normally with only those workers suspected of being sick not working. The rest of the workers continued to work as
before. They were not permitted to
leave, and were forced to remain in the factories.
In
the investigation of these factories, we found no cases of workers that had
been fired because of contracting an illness, but workers were often
temporarily taken off work or told to leave to seek medical attention. During this time the workers did not receive
any pay regardless of the cause of their illness. Typically workers would be allowed to return
to their jobs after 14 days. Outside of
the quarantine policies, the treatment that healthy workers received did not
change much during this SARS period.
Workers were provided with Chinese medicinal soup to drink to help
prevent SARS and employees began wearing masks that they had to purchase
themselves.
Perhaps
most emblematic of the powerlessness of the workers plight is that when a
worker came down with a fever, regardless of whether or not it was SARS, the
worker was without exception quarantined and was not paid or given any kind of
allowance during this time. The
corresponding loss of the right to leave their workplace for the fellow workers
placed a heavy burden and stress on those workers that were otherwise
healthy. The workers for the most part
were absolutely powerless and had to leave all decisions about their own lives,
safety and health to the local authorities and the plant managers, without any
means of having a voice in their own fate.
No independent unions exist that can act on behalf of the rights of the
laborers in these factories.
When
the factories had goods to produce, employees worked both normal and overtime
shifts. The only change is that workers
were not allowed to leave, except those suspected of having SARS. All other workers had to continue to work. An example of where this took place is Dongguan City’s
Changan Shili Electronics
Factory.
The Difficulties Faced by Migrant Labor
From
a health perspective, migrant labor became the focus of concern for many in the
government who were concerned that their movements may spread SARS to areas of
the countryside previously unaffected by the epidemic. For many concerned with the rights of
laborers, Migrant laborers are a focus of concern as they are all the more
vulnerable and less organized than there counterparts.
Migrants and Construction
According
to the United Morning Post in Beijing,
earlier in the summer it was officially disclosed by the Health Bureau that
migrant workers suffering from SARS reached 10% of total cases of SARS,
representing a significant increase in the infections among migrant
laborers. Before this, the highest cases
of SARS infections in Beijing were
hospital workers, officials, white collar workers, and retirees. It is believed that a big portion of these
infected workers are construction workers.
At the time of the report, besides hospitals and clinics, Beijing
had 5 places that were quarantined because of cross infections. Of these 3 of them were construction sites.
China’s
Yanhai City’s
rapidly developing construction industry employs a large number of low wage
migrant labors from inland China. Frequently, 30 migrants will live in a
temporary work shed next to the construction site that is only approximately 20
square meters. These facilities are not
only poorly ventilated, but are also crowded, making them a breading ground for
the spread of the disease. In response
to the SARS epidemic, Beijing City demanded that all work sites must ensure all
employees’ average living space is at least 2 square meters and that every room
can not have more than 15 people. In
addition, construction companies also must limit construction site workers’
coming and going, and at the same time every day take the temperatures of every
worker twice.
Large Numbers Returning Home
According
to a Zhongguang Network report on May 7th,
Henan
province in China,
has over 5,000,000 people that work outside the province as migrant
laborers. Because of SARS, many of these
migrant laborers went home in order to avoid infection in the cities where
there are more cases. As of May 7, the
number of returning workers was about to exceed 800,000 people. From May 1 to May 4 there were 290,000 people
who had returned and 75% of those that returned came from a SARS hotspot. This made the work of preventing and curing
cases all the more difficult.
Forced Health Inspections
One
precaution that was taken by local and federal governments was the forced
health inspections of migrant laborers returning home from the cities. According to a Dahebao
report on May 6, 2003, A villager in Henan province, Wuyang county, Xinan Town came
home from working outside the town at the end of April, and refused health
inspections claiming that not being sick was a good enough excuse not to
go. After receiving a visit on May 1 by
other town government official, Huang and his wife refused to submit to the
tests and insulted the authorities. The
people’s police then determined, in coordination with the town government’s
SARS prevention and control workers, to conduct a forceful health inspection. After eliminating suspicion that Huang Mo had
SARS, the county Public
Safety bureau, according to law, placed Huang Mo
under administrative detention and carried out educational criticism towards
his wife because of their treatment of the health workers and his refusal to
comply with SARS inspection.
Legal Methods of Enforcement
Another
element that led to some of the fear and concern about SARS in China
were the strict punishments that the government put in place to gain control of
the epidemic. The government said on May
15th that it may execute SARS patients who violate quarantine in the
most radical step so far to contain the epidemic. In a bid to curtail the spread of the
disease, China’s judiciary announced that under the country’s infectious
disease law SARS patients who violate quarantine restrictions could face
execution or life imprisonment:
“Intentionally spreading sudden contagious disease pathogens that
endanger public security or leads to serious personal injury, death or heavy
loss of public or private property will be punishable by 10 years to life
imprisonment or the death penalty,” Xinhua news
agency said.[xix]
People
who spread rumors about SARS or violate quarantine orders could face long
prison sentences under tough new standards laid down by China’s
Supreme People’s Court, state media said on Thursday. Those who violate their quarantine can be
sentenced to up to seven years in prison, while those convicted of
intentionally spreading rumors can be jailed for up to five years, the official
Xinhua news agency quoted a court circular as saying.
The
new interpretations of existing laws suggest jail terms of up to 10 years for
people convicted of giving illegal medical treatment and “severe punishment”
for firms selling fake medical products or hiking prices during and epidemic. Officials can also be jailed for neglect of
duty during a public health crisis, the agency said.[xx]
Conclusion
With
the advent of SARS and the hundreds it killed, thousands it sickened, and the
millions it frightened and otherwise affected, China Labor Watch found that the
major impact of SARS on the majority of workers was one of fear and
disempowerment. Because of the
illegality of independent representative unions, workers had no one to act on
their behalf to make sure their concerns, needs and best interests were being
looked after. China was affected in a
significant way on a macro-level but on a more local level the laws put in
place to prevent the spread of the disease and to protect workers resulted in
the closing of factories and the quarantining of thousands. Workers were not provided with the most
current information on what was going on and were not given a say in their own
lives. It will be difficult for the best
interests of workers to be looked after in such events without a representative
body that is able to push for their rights.