SAMUT PRAKAN: About 600 workers were tested for Covid-19 at a construction camp in Muang district and 15 of the tests have returned positive, about 2.5%.
Surat Phassadu, a public health specialist, late on Friday morning led officials to the camp in Soi Sukhumvit 117, tambon Bang Muang Mai, to take 12 of the workers to Samut Prakan Hospital for treatment - – one from Myanmar, five Thais and six Cambodian nationals.
Their tests showed they were infected with the novel coronavirus.
On Thursday, health workers engaged in active case finding took nasal swabs from all workers at the camp, about 600 in total.
The results came back on Friday. About 40 were still pending.
A source said later that three more had returned positive, and those workers would also be taken for treatment, raising the total number of infected workers at the camp to 15.
The camp operator was told to ensure no workers left the site.
Mr Surat said the movements of the infected workers were being checked. All were asymptomatic. The infected Thai workers lived in Bangkok’s Bang Khae district, Mr Surat said. The Bang Khae market complex is the centre of a virus cluster.
Health workers were being deployed on mass Covid-19 screening within a 500-metre radius of the camp. Nearby residents were advised to take precautions to protect themselves from infection.
Health workers arrive at the construction site in Samut Prakan to take the infected workers to hospital. (Photo: Sutthiwit Chayutworakan)