For 52-year-old Suhada Abdullah, a food delivery rider in Singapore and a single mother raising five children, every delivery matters. Every day, she spends 10 to14 hours riding through the city's streets to earn enough money to cover rent, food expenditures, and motorcycle expenses. But in October 2026, as thick smoke from Indonesia's forest fires drifted across Singapore, she developed a persistent cough. However, she could not afford to stop working. For her, every delivery she misses means less income to support her family. As the air grew increasingly hazardous, Suhada told Channel NewsAsia: “We still have to work no matter what.”
Suhada's struggle is far from unique. In October 2026, raging forest and peatland fires across Indonesia's Sumatra and Kalimantan regions sent clouds of smoke drifting across Southeast Asia. On October 14, Singapore's western region recorded a one-hour PM2.5 concentration of 288 micrograms per cubic metre, its highest reading since October 2015. Across Indonesia, the human toll was even greater. According to the Associated Press, citing Indonesia's Ministry of Health, more than 333,470 cases of acute respiratory illness had been reported across seven haze-affected provinces since mid-August. The smoke recognised no borders, yet its consequences were far from equal. While some could retreat indoors and close their windows against the polluted air, others had little choice but to continue working beneath it, their livelihoods depending on every hour spent outside.
For workers whose incomes depend on each day's workload, protecting their health and providing for their families are not always compatible choices. Lim, a 45-year-old Grab delivery rider who works approximately ten hours a day, described how the haze left his throat irritated and his eyes watering. Wearing a mask beneath his helmet in Singapore's heat only made his work more uncomfortable. Yet staying home was hardly an option: a day without deliveries meant a day without income. For platform workers, the pressure extended beyond immediate earnings. Shawn Lim, 35, had already been forced to take a day off after falling ill, while Siti Muhaini, another rider supporting seven children, worried that slower deliveries would prevent her from meeting incentive targets, pushing her to work longer hours to make up the difference. Even when platforms did not penalise riders for delays, the connection between completed deliveries and income made escaping the haze a luxury many could not afford.
The economic burden also reached small businesses and ordinary households. Some hawkers and outdoor food businesses interviewed by CNA reported revenue declines of up to 60% as customers avoided going outside. Meanwhile, more residents turned to food delivery to reduce their own exposure, shifting the burden of outdoor activity onto those bringing meals to their doors. The contrast was striking: while some people could protect themselves by staying home, others had to venture into the polluted streets to serve them. For small businesses, fewer customers meant lost revenue. For delivery riders, fewer working hours could mean unpaid bills. The danger of the haze, therefore, was not measured by pollution levels alone, but also by how much freedom people had to escape it.
In Indonesia, where the fires originated, communities faced even more immediate consequences. Peatland fires are notoriously difficult to extinguish, often smouldering beneath the surface long after the visible flames have disappeared. As respiratory illnesses mounted, students took to the streets, demanding stronger government intervention. Vincent Thomas, an Indonesian student protesting in Bandung, told the Associated Press that those responsible should be held accountable. He called on the government to declare a nationwide disaster emergency rather than treating the crisis as a problem confined to Kalimantan. Hundreds of kilometres away, fires burning through forests and peatlands were disrupting schools, hospitals, workplaces, and family life. The cost of a burning landscape was being paid far beyond the land itself.
As the public health crisis intensified, Singapore introduced measures to protect affected residents and workers. On October 12, the Ministry of Health launched the Haze Subsidy Scheme, offering subsidised treatment for eligible Singapore citizens suffering from haze-related conditions, including asthma, bronchitis, conjunctivitis, and upper respiratory infections. Public Assistance cardholders could receive fully subsidised treatment, while eligible Pioneer and Merdeka Generation seniors would pay no more than S$5, and other eligible citizens no more than S$10. On October 20, the Ministry of Manpower issued additional workplace guidance. When one-hour PM2.5 concentrations reached 251 micrograms per cubic metre or higher, employers were advised to minimise outdoor work for healthy employees and prohibit outdoor work for vulnerable employees, while providing appropriate respiratory protection and indoor rest breaks where outdoor work remained necessary. These measures offered important safeguards, but they also exposed a difficult reality: knowing when to avoid polluted air is not the same as being able to afford to do so.
In Indonesia, authorities were also struggling to bring the fires under control. According to Reuters, by October 22, more than 69,000 personnel and approximately 50 aircraft had been deployed for firefighting operations, including aerial water bombing and cloud seeding. The number of high-confidence fire hotspots had fallen from more than 1,200 on October 14 to 565, but insufficient rainfall left the risk of renewed fires dangerously high. Berton Panjaitan, a spokesperson for Indonesia's disaster management agency, warned that the decline remained unstable, with improvements varying across regions. As the fires continued, student protests, rising respiratory illnesses, and deteriorating air quality across neighbouring countries raised broader questions about emergency preparedness, environmental governance, and responsibility across borders. Extinguishing the flames was only part of the challenge; addressing the deeper failures in forest and peatland management would require much more.
Yet even though governments strengthened firefighting efforts, healthcare assistance, and workplace protections, Suhada continued to face a problem that no air-quality reading could fully capture. She still had five children to raise, household expenses to meet, and an income she could not afford to lose. Delivery platforms said riders would not be penalised for slowing down or going offline during the haze, but freedom from penalties did not mean freedom from financial consequences. For workers like Suhada, the question was never simply when the smoke would disappear. It was whether they could afford to stop working before it did.
The haze may eventually clear. But for those who cannot afford to stop working, one question remains: Who gets to decide when it is safe to breathe?
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