Under the labor law, the employer is generally required to (1) maintain conditions of safety and hygiene for the workplace, and (2) provide its employees with labor protection equipment. In particular, during the period of “social distancing” from 1 April to 15 April 2020, the Prime Minister has instructed all employers who are permitted to work from their offices during this period (Essential Business Employers) to adopt the following measures:

wearing face masks and providing sufficient equipment and facilities for prevention and fighting against the coronavirus as required by regulatory regulations and recommended by medical authorities. For example, according to the Ministry of Health’s (MOH) advice, an employer should conduct regular cleaning of workplace and equipment and provide employees with adequate protection facilities (mask, antiseptics);
requiring employees to conduct medical declarations and refraining from going outside, contacting others, and communicating with others;
avoiding temporarily non-emergency and unnecessary activities and reducing gathering of employees in limited space; and
organising and managing transport to carry employees to and from their workplaces (if any) in order to avoid the spread of Covid-19.

Essential Business Employers include, among other things:

manufacturing facilities;
construction sites;
distributors of essential goods such as foods, medicines, petrol, electricity and water;
training facilities;
transportation and logistic services;
telecommunication services;
business support services such as: legal services, and notary;
banking, securities services; and
healthcare.

All other employers should adopt work from home policy to ensure that there is no delay in its work flow especially those which have deadlines or are subject to time limitation period.

This post is written by Nguyen Hoang Duong and edited by Nguyen Quang Vu.

Vietnam Business Law