Southern Việt Nam is choking on haze as government officials refrain from warning residents.
The Latest: On the morning of Sept. 15, 2026, a thick layer of dust and severe air pollution blanketed multiple southern Vietnamese provinces and cities, yet no public agency had issued health advice to residents.
- A check of IQAir at 10:40 a.m. showed monitoring stations across multiple southern provinces and cities reporting air quality in the red, or “unhealthy,” category.
- High readings included Cần Thơ at 187 and Hồ Chí Minh City at 180.
From Social Media: On Threads, users repeatedly posted photos of roads shrouded in dense, fog-like dust.
- Locations included Nguyễn Thị Minh Khai Street in Bến Thành Ward, Võ Văn Kiệt Boulevard through An Lạc Ward, Nguyễn Văn Linh Street in Tân Thuận Ward, and National Highway 13 heading from the Bình Dương area toward the city center.
That morning, user loctr*** posted an IQAir screenshot on Threads with the message: “Everyone, please protect your health. The pollution is really bad.”
- The screenshot, taken at 6:56 a.m., showed a U.S. Air Quality Index reading of 156—classified as “unhealthy”—in the former Tân Phú district.
- The main pollutant was PM2.5, fine particulate matter, at a concentration of 62.2 micrograms per cubic meter.
From the Government: On the afternoon of Sept. 15, Hoàng Phúc Lâm, deputy director of the National Center for Hydro-Meteorological Forecasting, told Sài Gòn Giải Phóng that the haze over southern and south-central Việt Nam during the previous two days was not fog in the strict sense, adding that air pollution levels needed further investigation.
- As of 4:30 p.m. on Sept. 15, no government agency had issued any health advice to residents.
From Mainstream Media: At 3 p.m. on Sept. 15, Thanh Niên reported on air pollution in Hồ Chí Minh City, though their coverage did not address its spread across other southern provinces and cities.
- Thanh Niên attributed the pollution to “prolonged, widespread heavy rain that increases humidity and lowers temperatures, leaving fine dust particles attached to moisture suspended in the air and unable to disperse,” while also describing the phenomenon as seasonal.
Earlier reports by Nhân Dân on Sept. 5, VTV on Sept. 6, An ninh Thủ đô on Sept. 5, and CafeF on Sept. 14 all described haze spreading from Indonesia to neighboring countries.
- Each listed Malaysia, Singapore, and the Philippines as affected, but none of those Vietnamese-language reports included Việt Nam among the affected countries.
The Background: Southeast Asia is experiencing its worst cross-border haze episode since 2015, driven by forest and peatland fires in Sumatra and Borneo, Indonesia.
- According to the Copernicus Atmosphere Monitoring Service, Indonesian fires released more than 23 million metric tons of carbon from Aug. 28 to Sept. 3, exceeding the 20.7 million metric tons recorded during the same period in 2015, when the region suffered one of its worst haze crises on record.
- On Sept. 14, Climate Fact Checks reported that smoke from fires in Sumatra and Kalimantan had affected parts of Malaysia and southern Việt Nam.
- Earlier, Việt Nam News, the Vietnam News Agency’s English-language newspaper, published a report citing experts who forecast that the haze could reach mainland Southeast Asian countries.
Why It Matters: Article 12, Clause 2 of the 2020 Law on Environmental Protection states that air quality “must be monitored and supervised regularly and continuously and disclosed in accordance with the law.”
- Clause 3 of the same article requires that “air pollution conditions must be communicated, and warnings must be issued promptly to minimize impacts on public health.”
- Furthermore, Article 14, Clause 1, assigns the prime minister responsibility for “directing emergency measures when severe air pollution spans multiple provinces, regions, or national borders,” a provision triggered by this multi-province pollution episode across southern Việt Nam.
Withholding information is also strictly prohibited under Article 17, Clause 1, Point p of the 2026 Law on Access to Information, which lists “information on environmental quality and environmental pollution” and “results of soil and air quality monitoring” among the categories subject to mandatory public disclosure.
- Additionally, Article 5, Clause 1 prohibits “deliberately providing misleading or incomplete information, delaying the provision of information, or failing to provide data as required.”
- This law took effect Sept. 1, 2026—exactly two weeks before this haze episode.
Thành Phương wrote this news article in Vietnamese and published it in Luật Khoa Magazine on September 15, 2026. The Vietnamese Magazine translated it into English.
