The fight against the COVID-19 pandemic in Vietnam’s business hub of Ho Chi Minh City has seen higher efficiency as the numbers of new cases, severe patients and deaths have decreased while the number of discharged patients has increased rapidly, said a municipal official.
Tha data showed, 3,512 patients were hospitalized on September 25, a sharp decline compared to the previous days, according to the Chief of Office of the municipal Department of Health Nguyen Thi Huynh Mai.
The number of seriously ill patients who need support of ventilators fell to 1,918 on September 25 compared to 2,037 on September 23 and 2,174 on September 21, Mai said.
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The number of fatalities also saw a remarkable drop, with 131 deaths recorded on September 26 compared to more than 350 cases in late August, Mai stressed.
The number of patients discharged from hospitals has also been on the rise. On September 25, 3,495 patients were declared to be free from coronavirus SARS-CoV-2, an increase of 700-800 cases compared to 5-6 days ago, Vietnam News Agency reported.
The positive signals in pandemic prevention and control were also reflected in the declining rate of positive cases detected through mass testing.
The city began mass testing on September 22 and an average of 1 million samples have been taken a day. The number of positive cases has decreased gradually, according to Deputy Director of the city’s Centre for Disease Control Nguyen Hong Tam.
Specifically, the positive rate for SARS-CoV-2 was 0.2 percent in “green zones” on September 22, compared to 0.1 percent on September 25. Notably, in “orange zones”, only 0.3 percent of the tested cases were positive for SARS-CoV-2, while on September 22, this rate was 0.6 percent. Similarly, test results in “red zones” showed that the rate of positive cases for SARS-CoV-2 dropped sharply to only 0.4 percent, from 0.7 percent on September 22.
Facing such positive changes in the fight against the pandemic, the city’s Department of Health would devise measures that closely follow the real situation. The department plans to reduce the number of COVID-19 treatment hospitals and resume normal operations of facilities which were previously designated to only treat COVID-19 patients.
Mai said the city would restructure the three levels in COVID-19 treatment facilities and retain those associated with resuscitation centers, including Treatment Hospital No 13, 14 and 16, according to Vietnam News Agency.
