What will happen if you do not declare your health status when returning from an epidemic area?
The 2007 Law on Prevention and Control of Infectious Diseases strictly prohibits the act of concealing, failing to declare, or failing to promptly declare cases of infectious diseases as prescribed by law.
The 17th patient infected with the coronavirus and the first case in Hanoi had symptoms of coughing since February 29 while in the UK but did not go to the doctor. On March 1, the patient had body aches and an unknown fever and flew back to Vietnam.
On March 2, the patient began to have a mild fever but did not go to the doctor. It was not until he had a continuous fever accompanied by a lot of coughing, phlegm, and fatigue on March 5 that the patient went to the doctor and was later found to be infected with the corona virus.
According to Hanoi Secretary Vuong Dinh Hue, this female patient was aware that she was at risk of infection and causing illness, so she was proactive and did not come into contact with many people, but did not proactively report it to the authorities.
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| Authorities disinfect Truc Bach Street, where the female corona patient resides. Photo: Doan Bong |
The fact that the female patient infected with the corona virus did not proactively declare to the authorities led to a situation where many people did not know and had close contact with the patient, leading to mass quarantine of people and the entire neighborhood where the patient resided.
Violation of prohibition
Article 8 of the 2007 Law on Prevention and Control of Infectious Diseases strictly prohibits acts such as: intentionally spreading infectious agents; concealing, failing to declare or failing to promptly declare cases of infectious diseases as prescribed by law; failing to implement or failing to promptly implement measures to prevent and control infectious diseases...
Intentionally spreading, failing to report in a timely manner, and avoiding quarantine, which increases the risk of spreading the disease to the community, will be subject to administrative or criminal penalties depending on the severity.
Specifically, Clause 2, Article 6 of Decree 176/2013 of the Government stipulates administrative sanctions for violations in the health sector, anyone who conceals the status of group A infection (acute respiratory disease caused by corona virus) of themselves or others will be fined from 500 to 1 million VND.
In addition to being administratively punished, if the act of spreading the disease to others is at a level that requires criminal liability, the person committing that act will be punished according to Article 240 of the 2015 Penal Code.
Specifically,imprisonment from 1 to 5 years or fine from 50 to 200 millioncopperfor the cases:
- Taking out or allowing to take out of an epidemic area animals, plants, animal products, plants or other objects that are capable of transmitting dangerous epidemics to humans.
- Bringing or allowing to bring into the territory of Vietnam animals, plants or animal or plant products infected with diseases or carrying dangerous pathogens capable of being transmitted to humans.
- Other behaviors that spread dangerous diseases to people. Other behaviors include not destroying infected animals or plants, not isolating infected people... making it easy for diseases to spread...
Imprisonment from 5 to 10 years for the following cases::
- Leading to the declaration of an epidemic under the authority of the Chairman of the Provincial People's Committee or the Minister of Health.
- Kill people.
Imprisonment from 10 to 12 years for the following cases:
- Leading to the declaration of an epidemic under the authority of the Prime Minister.
- Killing 2 or more people
Thus, the behavior of the female patient infected with the corona virus violated the prohibited behavior, stipulated in Article 8 of the 2007 Law on Prevention and Control of Infectious Diseases: "Concealing, failing to declare or failing to promptly declare cases of infectious diseases as prescribed by law".
