I love you long time, Vietnam!

Plucky little Vietnam, eh?!  Well not so little actually, the population of Vietnam is 95 million, but at the time of writing, Vietnam has had total cases of 1069 and the death toll from both peaks of the pandemic is 35!

In the first spike of the pandemic Vietnam went head-to-head with Covid, full-on linear war with a nationwide lockdown, closed borders, social distancing, masks, all done early and had zero deaths.  People said it was weird, a fluke maybe, or lies.  But the truth was their intelligent leaders and disciplined people just did it better than us ...

On July 24, Vietnam was enjoying its 99th straight day without any known transmission of the novel coronavirus.

Second time round, this time in plain view so no-one can dispute the stats, the veteran Vietnamese wheeled out the same old weapons but this time augmented the assault with some extra kit and a non-linear strategy, all of which still eludes BoJo and Co: targeted lockdown and test, track and trace: non-linear warfare ...

https://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/2020/09/27/vietnam-crushed-second-coronavirus-wave/

In the ensuing days, infections were discovered in 15 other cities and provinces, including Hanoi and Ho Chi Minh City, the capital and largest city, respectively.

Unlike in March, however, when Vietnam faced its first major outbreak and implemented nationwide social distancing regulations, the government decided to take a more local approach in order to avoid large-scale economic damage.

Da Nang was placed under the strictest lockdown yet seen in the country, with transport to and from the city shut down and almost all businesses ordered closed, but regions remained relatively open.

Bars, karaoke parlors and nightclubs were closed in Hanoi and Ho Chi Minh City, while gatherings of more than 30 people were banned and masks were made mandatory in public again. However, other aspects of daily were allowed to carry on normally.

Meanwhile, massive Covid-19 testing was rolled out for anyone returning to these cities from Da Nang before its lockdown began, which included tens of thousands of people, and any new patients were isolated while rapid, detailed contact tracing was conducted.

These were the same tactics that the Vietnamese government deployed earlier in the year when the virus first broke out, and they were extremely effective.

And the results speak for themselves, Covid's arse was kicked into touch for an encore ...

By the end of August, the Da Nang lockdown and aggressive testing and tracing elsewhere in the country had slowed the outbreak to a crawl, and Vietnam has now gone over three weeks without any detected community transmission, ending this wave.

Domestic travel to and from the outbreak epicenter has resumed, and businesses in other major cities have returned to normal operations. Vietnam went from 417 total cases before July 24 to 1,069 at the time of writing, according to health ministry figures, indicating the size of the Da Nang outbreak, though a number of those are imported and quarantined infections.

Only 40 cases remain active nationwide, and an air of confidence has returned to the streets. After successfully containing its first outbreak in March and April, Vietnam can now take pride in defeating the coronavirus twice.

Clikey O'Leilly!  With leadership skills and people discipline like that, who'd ever want to have a go on the field of honour with them, eh?

Oh, err, yes, well um ...

SoD

 

 

Comments

[The Jannie]

I do wonder, though, whether they'll suffer from decreased immunity in the future, making the effects of this or some common or garden virus worse.

[decnine]

So, you believe their numbers?

[Whitewall]

What Jannie and decnine asked.

[Loz]

Even if the numbers were 10 times what they say, or 100 times what they say, our death and case rate would be higher.

So whatever uplift you apply to the stats for commie-lies, they've whipped us.

As for compromised immunity, maybe, but if it buys time for the vaccine, job done.

Or maybe not maybe. My Chinese work friend informs me China has had test, track and trace going since February, with an app that uses QR codes at venue entrances since then, and then updated to support the Apple / Google API as soon as it came out in July.

I tried Blighty's new NHS Covid 19 app the day it came out this week, Thu 24th, it works on QR codes and the Apple / Google API. It asked if I had a temperature, loss of taste, or cough. I've had a cough since last weekend, so I answered honestly.

I was immediately instructed to self-isolate for 8 days and get a test. It linked me through to the testing site with a valid code (you can't get voluntarily tested in Blighty, the app has to forward you, or a track and trace operator).

After a couple of hours of hitting the refresh button I was offered one 25 mins drive away on the same day, Thu. When I got there they weren't expecting me, some cock-up in the system. I booked another for Friday, an hour drive away. Went along, got it done, and received a message Sunday morning saying I was clear.

The app immediately cleared the isolation demand and said "get back to work you shirker".

So once the glitch is sorted that would be 2 days max, end-to-end. That"s what they've been doing in China and SE Asia since Feb.

But that aside, why not keep this going as the new normal? Add flu to the test done as well. Maybe the excess death rate will follow Norway and go negative as less people die from flu, pneumonia, Covid and other contagions.

Who cares about immunity when you got that system running nicely?

SoD

[Andra]

They speak with forked tongue.