Some government departments in Zhoushan, in East China's Zhejiang province, including the city's construction management service center and the center for disease prevention and control, jointly sent a team to carry out inspections at construction sites on Feb 21.

Members of the team also instructed managers and workers at the sites how to resume work in good order while protecting themselves from the COVID-19 epidemic.

By the end of Feb 21, 241 of the 253 construction sites in the city had resumed operations with the help of the government departments.

Over 3,000 workers at these sites have returned work, and more are expected to arrive in the city in the following days, said local authorities.

"The team's guidance is very crucial for our construction resumption work," said Mao Yinghua, director of an important real estate project. "Construction of the project was resumed on Feb 19. To date, about 50 managers and workers have returned to work."

"We bought more than 5,000 face masks for virus prevention and dispatched them to workers who had returned to work. Each worker is required to report his travel history and health condition every day."

According to Mao, the managers of the project regularly disinfect the construction site and check workers' temperatures to ensure their safety while working at the site.