HCM City (VNA) – HCM City has imposed stricter social distancing measures against COVID-19 by banning gatherings of more than threepeople and requesting people to maintain a minimum distance of 1.5 metre inpublic places, according to an urgent directive issued by the municipal People’sCommittee on June 19.
The directive orders the suspension of all non-essential businessesand services as well as street markets, and requests local residents to refrainfrom going outside, except for food, medicine, emergency care, orworking at factories.
It bans the gatherings of more than three people, instead offive in the previous order, in public places and outside offices, schools andhospitals while people must strictly observe the Ministry of Health’s 5K rules –“Khau trang” (face masks), “Khu khuan” (disinfection), “Khoang cach”(distancing), “Khong tu tap” (no gatherings), and “Khai bao y te” (healthdeclarations). It also demands tougher actions from authorities on violators.
Both governmental organisations and private enterprises areasked to cancel unimportant meetings, minimise interaction among employees andallow them to work from home. If in-person meetings and events are required,they should gather no more than 10 people.
Additionally, the directive orders the municipal Departmentof Transport to halt public transportation; and the local Department of Health toconduct mass coronavirus testing at high-risk areas, such as export processingzones, industrial and hi-tech parks. The city targets to collect about 500,000samples for testing per day.
HCM City has put six more areas – three streets in An Laccommune (Binh Tan district) and three hamlets in Tan Hiep commune (Hoc Mon district)– under lockdown to stamp out new outbreaks there.
The city has detected a total of 1,346 coronavirusinfections since April 27, making it the country’s current third largestCOVID-19 hotspot. Its daily count of new cases has increased to three digitsover the last several days.
The Ministry of Health announced that cases in HCM City wereinfected with the highly contagious Indian B.1617.2 variant, also known as theDelta variant. More local infections are expected in the city in the comingdays./.
HCM City told to apply smallest-possible-scale restrictions
Ho Chi Minh City has been asked to work harder to impose restriction measures on the smallest possible scale so as not to prolong large-scale social distancing.
