Medical staff collect samples from workers of Vietnam Samho
Co., Ltd, HCMC, June 11 2021. Photo by VnExpress/An Phuong. 

HCMC-based Vietnam Samho Co., Ltd has temporarily suspended 3,500 employees after three workers were detected with Covid-19. 

Local authorities have taken the three coronavirus positive workers, along with 84 others who came in close contact with them, to a centralized quarantine facility. With 10,000 employees, the South Korean company temporarily shut down one workshop on Wednesday, and another two on Thursday.

It has disinfected the factory and requested workers to comply fully with Covid-19 prevention measures.

Previously, footwear maker Pouyuen Vietnam, the biggest employer in HCMC with 56,000 workers, found one Covid-19 case Tuesday.

HCMC is home to 17 export processing zones, industrial parks, and hi-tech park with more than 320,000 workers.

Over 42.500 workers in HCMC were laid off in the first five months of 2021, and more than 9,300 enterprises stopped operations during the period due to the pandemic, according to the municipal Department of Labor, Invalids and Social Affairs.

The city has recorded 610 Covid-19 cases so far since the fourth wave broke out on April 27.