Vietnam must remain vigilant to guard against second COVID-19 wave

The request came during a meeting of the steering committee held in Hanoi on June 18 where delegates examined the possibility of easing travel restrictions with some countries that have successfully contained the epidemic. They also discussed the tightened control over arrivals entering the country as a result of the complicated COVID-19 developments occurring globally.

Deputy Minister of Health Nguyen Thanh Long emphasised that many nations have seen the outbreak of a second wave of the epidemic, posing a high risk of more COVID-19 cases to hit Vietnam.

He went on to request that relevant agencies remain vigilant and are ready to cope with any new scenario as the country moves into a new normal situation as it attempts to realise the dual goals of both combating the epidemic and boosting socio-economic development.

The steering committee maintained that a declaration of the end of the epidemic should be seriously considered, since Vietnam still has only a few COVID-19 patients under treatment while it continues to allow foreign experts and highly skilled workers to enter the country.

The committee assigned Deputy Minister of Foreign Affairs To Anh Dung to head a working group to work on regulations regarding the setting up of separate quarantine areas meeting epidemiological safety conditions for diplomats, investors, and businessmen to come and work in Vietnam.

According to a report issued by the steering committee, the novel coronavirus is showing signs of abating in Europe with some European nations moving to gradually relax measures and reopen their borders.

Elsewhere in the Americas, especially in both the United States and Brazil, the epidemic situation remains complicated with both countries seeing a sharp increase in cases and fatalities each day. Most worryingly, there seems to be an emerging trend of a second wave of the COVID-19 hitting some locations in Asia.

After going nearly two months without recording a single case of community infection, Beijing has become a new COVID-19 hot spot with the number of positive cases reaching more than 100 people.

The Beijing government has been swift to raise the emergency alert level, cancel more than 1,200 flights, close schools, while advising people to refrain from travelling.

In Tokyo, Japan, and Seoul, the Republic of Korea, the number of new COVID-19 cases in recent weeks has also increased dramatically.