FDHs ‘less healthy’ than average Hongkonger due to ‘poor’ working conditions  

The Chinese University of Hong Kong (photo from CUHK website)

Migrant domestic workers (MDWs) are “less healthy” compared to local Hong Kong residents due to their “poor working conditions,” according to a survey by one of Hong Kong’s top universities.

The Research Centre on Migration and Mobility (RCMM) of the Department of Sociology at The Chinese University of Hong Kong (CUHK) released this morning (February 13) the results of its survey on MDWs which showed that 70.6 percent of MDWs in Hong Kong work more than 13 hours a day.

“When compared with local residents, MDWs are less healthy, probably due to their bad work conditions,” a statement from the research centre said.

It said the survey assessed the physical and mental health of MDWs and the results showed that migrant domestic workers scored lower when compared to local residents.

“While the scores (for physical health) and (mental health) among local adults, according to a survey conducted in 2018, are 51.8 and 55.5 respectively, those of MDWs are 47.1 for (physical health) and 44.7 for (mental health),” the centre said.

“After adjusting for confounding factors, the result showed that never receiving wages on time, working on days off, and paying agency fees led to a lower (physical health) score; while not receiving wages on time, feel discriminated against and physical abuse by the employer led to a lower (mental health) score,” it added.

The survey was conducted from May to September 2017 by the research team in RCMM which interviewed 2,017 MDWs from the Philippines and Indonesia.

RCMM said the results showed that the employment conditions for MDWs in Hong Kong remained “poor.”

It said 43.9 percent do not have their own private room, 70.6 percent work over 13 hours per day, 34.6 percent need to work on their day-off, 5.9 percent have no day-off in a week, 23.7 percent do not have a day-off for all statutory holidays, 28.6 percent feel discriminated against, 3.9 percent are physically abused by their employer, 7.3 percent have never received their wage, 8 percent earned less than the statutory monthly required salary, 51.3 percent still have to pay their home agency and 46 percent still have to pay a local agency.