HANOI: Two million individuals in Vietnam will be put under a raft of restrictions beginning Tuesday after their northern province became the epicenter of a rising COVID-19 outbreak.
Residents of Hai Duong province have been ordered to stay at the residence for 15 days, state media reported, as a nation widely praised for its handling the pandemic struggles to extinguish a troubling new outbreak.
Since late January, Vietnam has recorded 637 locally transmitted coronavirus cases, including 461 in Hai Duong province alone.
“Individuals (in Hai Duong) are asked to stay at home and the only go out when essential, such as to buy food or medicine, or to work at factories or production establishments that are not being asked to shut,” mentioned the official mouthpiece of Vietnam’s health ministry, Suc Khoe Doi Song.
Gatherings of more than two individuals will be banned, whereas schools, bars, restaurants, and karaoke parlors that were shut early ahead of the Lunar New Yr holiday will stay closed.
When they must go outside their homes, residents are instructed to stay 2m from others.
Visitors through the province of two million will also be restricted, state media reported, with only vehicles traveling on essential business allowed to enter.
Along with the social distancing directive, Hai Duong authorities have requested that individuals quarantining at three centers within the province be relocated after infections recently began spreading at those sites, according to the government.
The capital Hanoi and the southern commercial hub Ho Chi Minh City each recently ordered schools closed till the end of February.
As of Monday morning, Vietnam had tallied 2,229 coronavirus cases and 35 deaths throughout populations of 95 million.
