Vietnam’s Ministry of Health on May 5 decided to extend the quarantine period by a week to 21 days after dozens of newest Covid-19 cases have been infected from people who completed the 14-day duration.

Vietnam officially extends quarantine period to 21 days from May 5. Photo: VNA

The extension, which began on May 5, will plus a week of home quarantine.

Vietnam imposes the 14-day mandatory quarantine since January 2021 for immigrants and people exposed to confirmed cases. After two negative test results, those people need to undergo another 14 days of self-quarantine under the authorities’ supervision.

The decision, according to Minister of Health Nguyen Thanh Long, was made based on the recommendations by a number of epidemiologists and virologists.

Vietnam lengthens the quarantine period after two chains of community infections in the fresh outbreak have been caused by those who finished the quarantine.

Local health experts have attributed the infection after the 14-day quarantine to three main reasons namely cross-infection within the quarantine centers and exposure to the virus after that period, infection abroad with the incubation of more than 14 days, and infection during travel and contacting with others.

Associate Prof. Nguyen Viet Nhung, director of National Lung Hospital in Hanoi, said some loopholes in the quarantine regulations or testing might cause unexpected consequences.

He stressed the importance of taking samples for testing, pointing out three reasons that might turn a positive result to negative, including non-qualified sample, unstandardized sample taking, and tester errors.

Echoing Nhung, Dr Nguyen Thi Ngoc Lan at Hanoi Medical University Hospital highlighted the role of taking samples. It means that right position and good techniques are absolutely important in this stage.

She noted that the testing might give false results [positive instead of negative] if one of following reasons are included, such as wrong storage process of samples, not enough amount of virus at the time of taking samples, and chemicals and testing equipment.

According to the US Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC), quarantine is used to keep someone who might have been exposed to COVID-19 away from others. Quarantine helps prevent spread of disease that can occur before a person knows they are sick or if they are infected with the virus without feeling symptoms.