In or Under Quarantine?

2022-02-26

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1
  • Hello! This week on Ask a Teacher we answer a question from Samuel in China. He writes,
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  • When I read the news, sometimes I see 'under quarantine', and at other times I see 'in quarantine.'
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  • Are they different in meaning? In the following sentence, which one should I use?
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  • Jerry left Hohhot for school in Hefei when the virus outbreak started in Hohhot.
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  • So, when he arrived in Hefei, he was put (under or in) quarantine in a quarantine hotel.
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  • Prepositions are tricky for Chinese English learners.
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  • I hope you can help clear my mind a little bit.
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  • Thank you in advance,
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  • Samuel, China.
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  • Dear Samuel,
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  • Thank you for writing to us.
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  • I am sure that almost everyone who is reading or hearing this knows that "quarantine" is the isolation of a person or a group of people to prevent the spread of infection to others.
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  • But it may not yet be clear how we use different prepositions with the word "quarantine."
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  • Let us begin with "under."
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  • Since May 2020, language researchers have collected what people are saying related to the pandemic in 20 different English-speaking countries.
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  • They call the result the Coronavirus Corpus.
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  • I searched in that collection and learned that "under quarantine" is much less common than "in quarantine."
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  • Here are some examples:
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  • All close contacts of the coronavirus cases have been placed under a quarantine order.
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  • Following his classmate's positive test, the 11-year-old was placed under quarantine on Thursday.
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  • Many countries put their entire populations under strict quarantine in order to prevent the virus from spreading.
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  • Compare these examples of how "in quarantine" appears.
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  • Some schools are offering meals to students in quarantine.
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  • New Zealand requires a 10-day stay in hotel quarantine for all travelers.
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  • Note that the words "put" and "place" appear before "under quarantine" in our examples.
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  • Often there is an official organization taking this kind of action.
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  • You can also find examples of putting or placing someone "in quarantine," but they are less common.
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  • The short answer to your question, Samuel, is that you would not be wrong to use either "under" or "in" before the word quarantine in your example,
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  • but English speakers would be more likely to use "under quarantine" after the verb "put" in the statement:
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  • When he arrived in Hefei, he was put under quarantine in a quarantine hotel.
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  • What question do you have about American English? Send us an email at learningenglish@voanews.com
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  • And that's Ask a Teacher.
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  • I'm Jill Robbins.