Three foreigners were denied entry into Vietnam at Noi Bai International Airport in Hanoi last week for having recently traveled to areas affected by the novel coronavirus (2019-nCoV) epidemic.

The first passenger, a 24-year-old U.S. woman, arrived at Noi Bai on Friday evening from Bangkok, Thailand.

She was turned away as she had traveled to a 2019-nCoV-hit location within the past 14 days, which is the incubation period of the virus.

On Saturday, a 35-year-old Malaysian man who boarded a flight from Kuala Lumpur to the airdrome was denied entry for a similar reason.

A 32-year-old South African woman arriving from Siem Reap, Cambodia on the same day was also refused entry for having stayed in China within the past 14 days.

Vietnam Airlines, Air Aisa, and Vietjet Air - the respective airlines which these passengers flew with - are in charge of taking them back to their airports of origin pursuant to established protocols.

The novel coronavirus, which first surfaced in Wuhan in December 2019, has killed 1,018 people and infected over 43,000 globally as of Tuesday, according to the South China Morning Post.

It has spread across mainland China and to 27 other countries and regions, Reuters reported on the same day.

Vietnam has so far confirmed 15 cases, including 12 Vietnamese, one Vietnamese American, and two Chinese.

Among them, one Chinese and five Vietnamese have fully recovered and been discharged from the hospital as of Monday. They were all treated for free.

Nearly 550 people remained in quarantine in Vietnam because of 2019-nCoV as of Monday evening, including 64 cases of suspected infection and 483 asymptomatic cases isolated due to having recent close contact with high-risk individuals, according to the Ministry of Health.

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