HCMC Covid-19 relief package reaches 220,000 informal workers

The city has around 231,000 informal workers, according to official data, and 95 percent have accessed to the relief package.

As regulated, each informal worker is given VND1.5 million from a VND886-billion financial package for citizens impacted by the pandemic that the city approved last month.

Of 21 districts and Thu Duc City, four districts – 10, Binh Tan, Phu Nhuan and Nha Be – have finished handing over the funds to all informal workers in their areas, said Le Minh Tan, director of the municipal Department of Labor, Invalids and Social Affairs.

The remaining 11,000 informal workers in the city, who have been sent to quarantine zones or confined in blockaded areas, or have returned to their hometowns, have all been listed and will receive the money once they are available, he said.

In the coming time, the city will focus on providing relief funds to 80,000 contract workers who have had to stop working or lost their jobs. It will also help 60,000 vendors at traditional markets and 10,000 business households that have been forced to stop operations.

Other people on the relief recipient list from the package are those unable to work because they have been sent to centralized quarantine zones; and those who have joined the frontlines of the Covid-19 fight.

The package is the second that the city has released to support people affected by Covid-19.

During the first wave last year, the city had spent more than VND587 billion to support more than 536,000 people.

HCMC is leading the nation in the number of cases in the ongoing Covid-19 wave that began in late April. The southern metropolis has recorded more than 22,500 cases so far.