Learning English: Vietnam Faces New Wave of COVID-19 Infections

Vietnam’s government said Wednesday it is stepping up measures against a sudden wave of coronavirus infections in the country. The latest outbreak came after 100 days without any reported cases of COVID-19. 

 At the government’s daily COVID-19 meeting, Prime Minister Nguyen Xuan Phuc said “The outbreak this time has a high risk of spreading to other big cities and provinces around Da Nang.” 

Over the past five days, officials confirmed 34 new cases of infections coming from the popular beach city of Da Nang. They included an American who had been in Da Nang and his partner. The two are now hospitalized in Ho Chi Minh City. A woman in the central highland area of Dak Lak also tested positive for the coronavirus. She had worked at Da Nang Hospital. 

Image: Tourists wear protective masks as they wait to check-in for departure at Da Nang Airport, Vietnam July 26, 2020. 

In the capital city of Hanoi, health officials closed a restaurant for disinfection after a worker tested positive for the coronavirus. The man had recently returned from Da Nang.

The government estimates that tens of thousands of tourists left Da Nang after the outbreak. They included 18,000 who returned to Ho Chi Minh City, the business center of the country. 

The government on Tuesday suspended all flights to and from Da Nang for 15 days. The prime minister told state-broadcaster VTV that Da Nang must go under “strict lockdown” and other popular cities had to be more watchful. 

With over 95 million people, Vietnam had managed to keep its coronavirus infections to about 450 cases. It did this with an aggressive program of quarantine and contact-tracing. Vietnam is the most populous country in the world to have recorded no deaths from the virus. And until now, the country reported no local infections for more than three months. 

The source of the new COVID-19 infection in Da Nang remains unclear. But Vietnamese scientists have said this strain of coronavirus appeared to be more infectious than the earlier one. They said it is similar to the one found in Bangladesh, Britain and Ireland. 

The government has not officially linked the new cases to illegal immigration. But Prime Minister Phuc has ordered police to restrict illegal entries. And state media on Sunday said police in Da Nang had arrested a 42-year-old Chinese man. He was suspected of smuggling people across the border from China. 

Adam McCarty is chief economist with Mekong Economics in Hanoi. He told VOA, “It could be another outbreak, and it’s really sort of scared the Vietnamese, because they thought they’d gotten through it all, but as the rest of the world discovered, this thing spreads much quicker than you think.” 

Jack Nguyen is a partner with the firm Mazars in Ho Chi Minh City. He said, “We’re hoping it doesn’t spread out, because if it does, they’ll do another lockdown, and it’s going to impact business hard.” 

Nguyen Thi Kieu Trinh and her family just canceled their planned vacation in Phu Quoc Island. She told the website VNExpress "I would rather lose the money than risk getting infected on a plane or at the airport. Even staying in Hanoi makes me nervous." 

Tay Bac, a popular travel agency in Ho Chi Minh City, said that over 20,000 Vietnamese have canceled their summer vacations, as of July 26. And some even canceled tours during the month of September.

I’m Jonathan Evans. Hai Do wrote this story for VOA Learning English with additional reporting from VOA, Reuters, Associated Press and VNExpress. Mario Ritter, Jr. was the editor.

Words in This Story

outbreak –n. the sudden appearance of an infectious disease or conflict

test positive –v. to have a medical test find evidence of a disease

lockdown –n. a situation in which people are told to stay in their homes for security reasons

quarantine –n. keeping a person apart from others in an effort to stop the spread of an infectious disease

strain –n. one of several kinds of closely related organisms

smuggling –n. to move people from one country to another illegally or secretly

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Source: learningenglish.voanews.com

Five Keys to Success Every Woman in Business Should Know

Dear Folks,

How have you been?

I hope you all guys are fine.

Well, welcome back to my blog Lylymom.

For this blog post, I would like to share with you the five keys to success that every women should know in their business...Those five things are listing below...

1. Follow your curiosity

2. Reach for more

3. Build a network, and use it

4. Share a different perspective

5. Speak up often

More details of all the above points, please continue reading below...

1. Follow your curiosity

You don’t have to follow a traditional career path—every woman’s path to success is different. It is worthwhile to follow not only your passions, but also your curiosities. “Don’t strive for perfection. Perfection is the enemy of good,” said Saperstein. “You have to get out there and make things happen, take action, not study things to death, and be curious.”

2. Reach for more

Always strive to achieve more – and don’t settle. Today’s workforce is seeing a plateau when it comes to women in senior level roles. According to Saperstein, female employees are not leaving the company more than their male counterparts. “Attrition rates aren’t higher for women. In the industry overall, women are not leaving to raise their families – they are just staying at the same levels,” she said.

Companies and their employees, both male and female, need to do more to identify barriers to career advancement, create meaningful change, and propel women to the next level.

Saperstein recommends that companies analyze their promotion and performance data regularly to identify where women are most underrepresented and then commit the resources to address these issues.

3. Build a network, and use it

Throughout your career, it is important to build and maintain your network, and use those connections to uncover new career opportunities. “Be a collector of people. Find people you can interact with and keep in touch with them. You never know when things are going to come around and later in life you are going to want to get in touch,” said Saperstein.

4. Share a different perspective

There are many instances in which women may feel silenced in the workplace, which is detrimental to diversity of thought and promotes group think.

“You can play a role in driving an inclusive environment,” said Saperstein. “You can look around and say, ‘Do we have everyone represented?’ Are you actually soliciting voices all the time, asking the quieter people what they think? All of these things on a day-to-day basis can add up to make a more inclusive environment.”

5. Speak up often

Don’t be afraid to be heard. “If you are in a room with a lot of people and you are hesitant to speak up, say something early because it gets you in the door. It breaks the ice so you feel more comfortable and it establishes that you have a reason to be there.”

Source: Five Keys to Success Every Woman in Business Should Know