Localities rush to set up concentrated quarantine sites

HCM City (VNS/VNA) - Neighbouring provinces around Ho Chi Minh City are rushing to set up concentrated quarantine sites to receive Vietnamese nationals returning from overseas who are subjected to mandatory quarantine amid the COVID-19 outbreak.

The Central Highlands province of Lam Dong will arrange the Da Lat city’s Student Dormitory with 960 beds and the province’s Nursing Centre for People with Merit with 170 beds as concentrated quarantine areas for returnees from overseas, said Doan Van Viet, chairman of the provincial People’s Committee.

The move aims to reduce the burden of similar quarantines areas in HCM City that have become overloaded, and Tay Ninh and Long An provinces, Viet said.

The province’s concentrated quarantine sites will able to receive at least 2,500 people who are subject to mandatory 14-day quarantine, Viet said at a meeting on March 25.

He assigned the province’s Department of Transport to allocate vehicles to transport people to quarantine areas from Lien Khuong International Airport in Lam Dong province as well as locations from HCM City and Long An province. 

The southern province of Ba Ria-Vung Tau has six concentrated quarantine sites that will receive at least 3,500 returnees from overseas in order to ease the overload at concentrated quarantine centres in neighbouring localities.

Tran Van Tuan, deputy chairman of the provincial People’s Committee, said the province has approved several hotels as quarantine facilities to receive people who are willing to pay for mandatory quarantine at hotels.

The province plans to organise four trips on March 28 and 29 and April 2 and 3 to send a total of 2,000 people to quarantine sites in the province.

The southern province of Binh Phuoc, which shares a 210-km border with Cambodia, has arranged concentrated quarantine areas with a total of 5,000 beds.

Quach Ai Duc, director of the provincial Department of Health, said that nearly 300 Vietnamese people returning home from Cambodia had been put under mandatory quarantine in the province’s concentrated quarantine areas.

Twenty people tested negative for COVID-19.

The provincial People’s Committee ordered the Department of Health to mobilise financial resources for tests for the remaining people who have returned from overseas since March 1./.