American tourist tests Covid-19 positive in Da Nang

Since February 11, he had visited India, Spain, Morocco, Switzerland, Germany, Hungary and the Netherlands, then transited at Singapore before landing at the Da Nang International Airport at around 11 a.m. last Saturday on Silkair flight MI632.

After he submitted a health declaration, the patient was transferred to the 199 Military Hospital. Tests done at the Da Nang Center for Disease Control Wednesday morning showed he was infected with the novel coronavirus, and this was later re-confirmed by a second test at the Nha Trang Pasteur Institute.

Apart from "Patient 68", Da Nang has confirmed three Covid-19 cases - two British tourists on Vietnam Airlines flight VN54 from London to Hanoi on March 2, and a Vietnamese saleswoman who’d come into contact with them.

52 of the nation’s 68 Covid-19 infections have been detected since March 6, prior to which the nation had gone 22 days without a new case. The previous 16 patients have been discharged from hospitals.

The Covid-19 pandemic has spread to 165 countries and territories, claiming nearly 8,000 lives.