Information at the socio-economic press conference on the afternoon of February 26, Ms. Le Hong Nga, Deputy Director of the Ho Chi Minh City Center for Disease Control, said that the situation of infectious diseases in the area before and during the Lunar New Year was basically stable.
The number of dengue fever and hand, foot and mouth disease cases decreased significantly. Specifically, in the week from February 16-22, Ho Chi Minh City recorded 452 cases of dengue fever, down 57.7%, and 281 cases of hand, foot and mouth disease, down 56% compared to the average of the previous 4 weeks. The city has also not recorded dangerous infectious diseases of group A such as avian flu H5N1 or Nipah virus.
However, the health sector warns that this is a time of increasing respiratory diseases such as chickenpox, mumps, rubella, flu, meningococcus, and at the same time, there is a potential risk of disease transmission from animals to humans. It is predicted that in the near future, dengue fever and hand, foot and mouth disease may increase again cyclically, especially in crowded areas and closed spaces.
To proactively control the epidemic, the Department of Health requests units to strengthen surveillance, early detection and timely handling of outbreaks. Health stations coordinate with schools to monitor students' health, ensure personal hygiene and environmental hygiene, and organize full vaccination and booster vaccination for children.
In parallel, Ho Chi Minh City is implementing environmental sanitation campaigns, handling risk points, and killing larvae to prevent and control dengue fever. The network of community health collaborators is also strengthened to support monitoring, communication and epidemic handling at the grassroots level.
In particular, the health sector has developed a plan to ensure health for the upcoming election day, focusing on environmental control at polling stations, limiting the risk of outbreaks. Rapid response teams have been strengthened and trained to be ready to handle public health situations.
The health sector recommends that people proactively clean their personal hygiene and living environment, remove mosquito breeding grounds and take children for full vaccination, contributing to effective disease control in the coming time.
