Surveillance on illegal immigrants detected in the community under COVID-19 prevention and control activities in Vietnam - China border provinces from February to July 2020

Tóm tắt

The study described the situation of health management for illegal immigrants across the Vietnam - China border who returned to their residence of 7 provinces. Out of 19,332 illegal immigrants being detected from February to July 2020; 1,735 people were detected in the community (9.0%) where Lang Son, Ha Giang, Cao Bang, Lao Cai provinces were the hotspots. Seven hundred forty-three persons (42.8%) had self-reported or been reported to the authorities by their relatives; local people's reports notified 513 people (29.6%). More than 96.4% of illegal immigrants were detected within three days of returning to Vietnam. Each illegal immigrant made contact with an average of 6.9 people (rang: 0-52 people). More than one thousand illegal immigrants (61.4%) were sampled for SARS-CoV-2 PCR testing, of which 11.7% were tested on the day of detection, and 76.9% were taken in total two samples. A hundred percent of samples were negative for the SARS-CoV-2 virus. Thus, the community had a vital role in detecting and notifying the risk group to the authorities. Medical management of illegal immigrants was done quickly. Still, testing for all was not possible due to limited resources at this time, so no potential risk was detected from missing people infected with the SARS-CoV-2 virus.