Coronavirus: hundreds of contaminations on an oil field in Kazakhstan

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The Tenguiz oil field in western Kazakhstan has seen half of its employees, 17,000 people, evacuated from the industrial site in recent days due to the coronavirus. Nearly 400 workers have tested positive for Covid-19. 

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From our correspondent in the region,  Régis Genté

There are approximately 34,000 employees at the Tenguiz oil field in western Kazakhstan. And half of them were reportedly sent home, while the rest of the workers were asked to stay at home while they were on shift work. These decisions were made after the discovery of contamination with the new coronavirus on the oil field.

Alerts in April

Around 3,000 workers are still at work on this site on the shores of the Caspian Sea, so as not to stop the production of crude. This deposit, developed from 1993 by the Tengizchevroil consortium and 50% owned by the American Major Chevron, represents a third of production in Kazakhstan.

In total, 401 cases of Covid-19 were discovered on the site, we learned Friday, May 15. Figures that irritate many employees. A month ago, 500 of them had disengaged in order to alert the American management of the risk of contagion in their ranks. Health Minister Yelzhan Birtanov sharply criticized Tengizchevroil's management: "  Both during work and during rest, workers are in contact with each other, which makes it difficult to halt the development of infection.  "

Authorities are concerned about the situation, against the backdrop of falling oil prices  due to the coronavirus pandemic. Kazakhstan has reported only 6,100 cases of confirmed infections and 34 deaths, but these figures, as in other countries of the world, raise doubts.

► Also read  : Oil and the environment: is coronavirus a game-changer?

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• Kazakhstan
• Coronavirus
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