JAKARTA - Prime Minister Pham Minh Chinh warned that Vietnam could face a long battle against COVID and could not rely on indefinite lockdown and quarantine measures.
Vietnam has deployed soldiers and forced residents of its largest city to stay in their homes in recent weeks in the most drastic measure to combat an outbreak that has shattered what is one of the world's best outbreak containment records.
"We cannot use quarantine and lockdown measures forever, as it will cause hardship for the people and the economy," said Prime Minister Pham Minh Chinh, quoted by Reuters via Antara, Wednesday, September 1.
Aggressive contact tracing and quarantine procedures in the country of 98 million people have kept the virus under control for more than a year. But the highly contagious Delta variant has hit Vietnam hard.
Total cases jumped from just a few thousand at the end of April to 480,000 today, with more than 12,000 deaths. Ho Chi Minh City is the worst affected area. Authorities reported 13,197 infections and 271 deaths as of Thursday today.
The restrictions are causing "material and mental hardship," Chinh said as he met with experts to hear ideas on efforts to fight the virus.
The measures have also forced companies in labor-intensive businesses, including suppliers to brands such as Nike and Adidas, to suspend operations.
Vietnam's industrial output in August fell 7.4 percent from a year earlier, while exports fell 5.4 percent. Retail sales of goods and services plunged 33.7 percent, according to official government figures.
Chinh said preventing deaths was a top priority and vaccination was a key strategic step.
Only 2.9 percent of Vietnam's population has been inoculated, while the death rate is 2.5 percent higher than the global rate of 2.1 percent, according to health ministry data.
"The COVID-19 pandemic is evolving in a complex and unpredictable way and can last a long time," Chinh said.
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