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Nine percent of foreign workers fail health check

About 9 percent of foreign laborers in Taipei City failed physical examinations last year, leading to the repatriation of 30 workers, a Taipei City Government health official said yesterday.

Wang Yung-wei (王永衛), director of the Department of Health’s disease control unit, said that of the 33,799 foreign laborers who underwent physical examinations last year, 8.76 percent, or 2,962, failed the health checks.

PARASITES

Most failed because they had intestinal parasites, he said. In the screening for 10 types of parasite, 2,814 workers were found to have blastocystis hominis, a single-cell parasite that infects the gastrointestinal tract in humans and animals, he said.

Symptoms of intestinal parasites include diarrhea, abdominal pain, anorexia and vomiting.

Wang said that people infected with blastocystis hominis are usually prone to anemia, but that foreign laborers working in the construction sector who are infected with the parasite pose no risk to other employees.

However, if they are employed as domestic helpers or caretakers, people living with them should be more careful and foreign workers should wash their hands frequently, he said.

TUBERCULOSIS

Wang said that X-ray examination showed that 30 workers had tuberculosis, which is a communicable disease. Those workers were repatriated, he said.

Foreign laborers who fail health checks are allowed to remain in Taiwan if their health problems can be treated and cured, he said.

Under the law, foreign laborers are required to take physical examinations six, 18 and 30 months after their arrival in Taiwan.

The health checks include chest X-ray examination, tests for the AIDS virus, syphilis, parasite, and leprosy, as well as a general condition appraisal.
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