Vietnam mulls removing Covid-19 from 'especially dangerous' diseases list

By Viet Tuan March 17, 2022 | 06:52 am PT

A woman holds a girl at the Covid-19 testing area for people flying in from HCMC at Noi Bai Airport in Hanoi, July 2021. Photo by VnExpress/Giang Huy

Vietnam will consider delisting Covid-19 as a Class A infectious disease, the list of diseases that are classified as "especially dangerous," the government announced Thursday.

The announcement was made in accordance with a 2022-2023 Covid-19 prevention program issued the same day.

Class A infectious diseases include those with high infection and death rates, like polio, influenza A-H5N1, plague, smallpox, Ebola, Lassa and Marburg hemorrhagic fever, West Nile fever, yellow fever and cholera.

The removal of Covid-19 from the Class A list of infectious diseases would be a milestone in Vietnam's strategy to fight the novel coronavirus, and serve as a premise for authorities to issue new adaptation policies.

In February 2020, the then Prime Minister Nguyen Xuan Phuc had declared Covid-19 as a Class A infectious disease. It was declared a national epidemic in April 2020.

This year, Vietnam aims to fully vaccinate its 12-18 population within the first quarter, while giving third vaccine shots to all adults and ensuring children aged 5 to 11 are vaccinated before September.