Vietnam’s Shifting Response to the Covid-19 Challenge

Since April 2021, perspectives on the effectiveness of Vietnam's Covid-19 response have changed. Before, Vietnam's near-total suppression of the virus had analysts glowing about the country's successful response.1 As of early November 2020, Vietnam had recorded only 1,207 total cases and had gone 64 consecutive days without a recorded case of community transmission.2 Based on these metrics, the country's Covid-19 response outperformed neighboring states such as the Philippines, Indonesia, and Myanmar as well as much of the developed world. Vietnam's success in managing the health crisis translated to relative economic gains, avoiding the declines suffered by these same neighbors. As a result, in 2020, Vietnam overtook the Philippines in per capita income for the first time since World War II. Then came April 2021 and the arrival of the Delta variant. With the more contagious strain, clusters mushroomed throughout the country, particularly in the economically vital Ho Chi Minh City metro area. From July to September 2021, Vietnam attempted to respond and eliminate Covid-19 through the same restrictive measures used to quell outbreaks in 2020. Unfortunately, this time the strict measures suppressed economic performance but not the disease, with Vietnam seeing a sharp 6.17% decline in GDP in the third quarter of 2021.4 Economic strain as well as pressure from business groups and international investors led Vietnam to lift its most restrictive measures in Ho Chi Minh City in September, signaling the end of the "Zero Covid" strategy. This essay discusses Vietnam's evolving response to Covid-19, detailing its successful strategies in 2020 and the undermining factors in 2021. It also examines prospects for 2022, focusing on the population's continued trust in government response and the overall low degree of skepticism regarding vaccination. As of November 2021, Vietnam seems unlikely to return to the severe lockdowns of 2020 and early 2021. At the same time, it is unclear just how fully the government will open the country and its economy given the caution that still pervades some quarters of the Communist Party of Vietnam and the emergence of new variants, such as Omicron.