Thai Factory Has To Work Night Shifts To Make Enough Body Bags For COVID-19 Deaths

As of now, the coronavirus has affected the entire world for over a year and there are no signs of an end to this pandemic. In total, there are over 116 million COVID-19 cases across the globe with more than 2.5 million deaths.

The US, India, and Brazil have the highest tallies, recording 29.5 million, 11.1 million, and 10.7 million cases, respectively. Currently, the US still records more than 500,000 new cases every day. While this is very bad news for infected patients and their families, a business is quietly thriving alongside the increase in the cases.

Winbest Industrial is a factory in Thailand that manufactures medical supplies. Especially, Winbest is now witnessing the highest demand for body bags ever since 2004 when the Indian Ocean tsunami killed 200,000 people.

Every day, the factory produces at least 300 body bags and the majority of them are shipped to the US due to the high daily number of new cases though COVID-19 vaccines have helped slow the spread of the virus. Arawan Saythawin, a worker at the factory, said:

“We realize that our jobs are more important and there’s more responsibility now. We understand why the orders have been increased and we feel added pressure to meet our goals and our projected numbers.”

Apart from medical supplies, the factory also makes beauty products and room cleaning supplies, but body bags are currently the main event.

Due to the higher demand for body bags from the US, Winbest had to add a night shift and is talking with distributors in Europe. The company has also doubled the number of employees to produce body bags. Notably, workers are earning more money than usual too. Normally, they make about $350 (Rs 25,600) per month, but their wages have increased to $400 (Rs 29,200) or even higher these days.

As Thailand is not badly affected by the pandemic with less than 100 deaths and only over ten new cases per day, the thriving body bag business turns out to be a good thing for them.

“In a way, the pandemic is actually a good thing for us [at Winbest], because now we’re producing more and making more money. So it’s a good thing in that sense.”

Of course, that doesn’t mean the factory and these workers a happy about the pandemic and the dead patients.

“Sometimes when I turn on the TV and I see a body bag being used on the news, I wonder, was that mine? Did I make that?”

While they are making a better living than before the pandemic, it’s quite terrifying and haunting to watch the news, see those dead bodies, knowing that they might be kept in the bags they made. So, no matter what, we hope COVID-19 will be over soon.

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