Thanks @Virusnerdette and @hrogier. Yes, Vietnam has had a number of experiences in this area, and #epitwitter readers should remember that H5N1 outbreaks in poultry are regular occurrences, so the public health system is set up for this type of response. 1/
In 2009, when a new subtype/variant of influenza was announced to be infecting humans (Friday April 24 2009) Rogier and I were at a happy hour at O'Brien's in HCMC (early evening in HCMC, daytime/morning in Geneva/NY). The public health response got moving right away ... 2/
.. even though this was an emerging epidemic in Mexico, literally a half-a-globe away from Vietnam. I just checked my files, and the earliest quarantine date I can find is May 10 2009 (tested negative) for a passenger landing at HCMC airport, but I am pretty sure that the ... 3/
... airport screening started on Monday April 27. Now, there has been some recent critique of airport screening measures, and it's true that they don't work when the epidemic is already generating hundreds of new cases in-country. But, early-stage airport screening .. 4/
.. can work. It helped delay the 2009 H1N1 epidemic in HCMC by 3-5 weeks (probably; no counter-factual obviously). And in HK, SG, TW, the contact tracing that is in place initially starts with cases identified at the airport or linked back to international travel. 5/
Rogier and I wrote this up here mol.ax/pdf/hien10.pdf . Similarly, H7N9 infections in humans were announced on Sunday March 31 2013 (publicly). By Friday April 12, OUCRU had written up results on H7 antibodies in the Vietnamese population (they were absent) because a ... 6/
.. serum bank was available to rapidly assay samples. We were lucky of course that we had a microarray technology ready (thanks to @MarionKoopmans) with an H7 antigen from the Dutch outbreaks in 2003. 7/
All this to say that yes Vietnam, MoH, NIHE, @OUCRU_Vietnam are very well prepared for emerging disease scenarios. Also, check w @HienTT51 @bshavinh @VinhChau_Nguyen @hannahhec @choisy_marc @maladjustoid @Baker_Lab_Cam @ThwaitesGuy for more opinions. 8/
