Villages in Vietnam with 10,000 people close to Hanoi, the capital were placed under quarantine on Thursday after six cases of the deadly new coronavirus were discovered there, authorities said.

The locking down of the commune of Son Loi, about 40 kilometres (25 miles) from Hanoi, is the first mass quarantine outside of China since the virus emerged from a central Chinese city late last year.

“As of February 13, 2020, we will urgently implement the task of isolation and quarantine of the epidemic area in Son Loi commune,” said a health ministry statement.

“The timeline… is for 20 days”.

Son Loi is a farming region made up of several villages.

The health ministry previously said five people in Son Loi had been infected with the virus, and on Thursday reported a sixth case.

More than 1,350 people have died in China from the virus, and nearly 60,000 others have been infected, since it was first detected in the Hubei province in early January.

China has imposed unprecedented quarantines across Hubei, locking in about 56 million people, in a bid to stop it spreading.