Economic damage related to the pandemic continues to mount.

As Vietnam's worst COVID-19 outbreak of the entire pandemic lumbers on, VnExpress reports that the General Statistics Office has found that 12.8 million workers were affected in the second quarter of 2021.

This is a 41% increase over Q1, when the virus was largely contained nationwide. Overall, 75% of these workers are in the 25–54 age group. Impacts include lost jobs, reduced hours and lowered income due to the pandemic.

Unsurprisingly, workers in urban areas were hit harder than their rural counterparts, with 21.9% of people working in cities reporting a negative impact, compared to 14.3% in the countryside. 

Additionally, the number of unemployed people nationwide rose to 1.2 million, up 7.3% from the first quarter, while the overall average income fell by 3.8% to VND6.1 million per month.

VnExpress further reports that industrial areas in and around Saigon are struggling to maintain production amid the COVID-19 chaos. For example, a factory run by Jabil in Vietnam in Thu Duc City with 4,500 employees has been shut down due to infections, while the Nidec Vietnam factory in the Saigon Hi-Tech Park is housing thousands of workers in tents so that they can remain at work.

At the time of writing, this COVID-19 wave had accounted for 19,238 cases of community transmission, with Saigon exploding in recent weeks into the national epicenter, with 8,002 cases recorded thus far.

[Photo via Flickr user ILO Asia-Pacific]