Hanoi, Apr 28: The World Health Organisation today declared that Vietnam is the world's first country to contain its SARS outbreak. At a news conference in Hanoi, the organization also said it was lifting its advisories against travel to the communist country.
No new cases of Severe Acute Respiratory Syndrome have been reported in Vietnam since April 8.
WHO set a 20-day window, double the disease's incubation period, as the standard for lifting the travel advisories and declaring that the outbreak is no longer spreading. Vietnam had five deaths from SARS after the virus spread in February through Hanoi's only international hospital.
Sixty-three people contracted the virus. But the Hanoi French Hospital closed its doors on March 11, a move credited with slowing the rate of infection and keeping SARS from spreading beyond its doors. The Vietnamese government "showed strong commitment at the highest level from the beginning of the outbreak," the WHO said in a statement during the weekend. Bureau Report