Vietnam’s local Covid-19 tally up by 47 with 36 cases were recorded in Ho Chi Minh City, nine in the northern province of Bac Giang, and one each in the central province of Nghe An Province and the Central Highlands’ Gia Lai Province.
In HCMC, 30 cases are those that have had direct contact with Covid-19 patients, three related to a church cluster emerging late last month in Go Vap District and the sources of transmission for another three are still unclear.
The nine cases in Bac Giang are related to clusters at its industrial parks.
The patient in Nghe An had come into close contact with a Covid-19 patient while the one in Gia Lai is a 16-year-old boy who has contracted the new coronavirus after returning from Covid-19 hit Binh Duong Province, a neighbor of HCMC. He has marked the first infection in Gia Lai after 20 clean days.
Since the new wave started April 27, Vietnam has recorded 10,258 local Covid-19 cases in 42 cities and provinces.
Bac Giang and HCMC suffer the highest number of infections, 5,466 and 1,820.
The country has more than 13,500 cases since the pandemic hit, according to VNExpress.
HCMC may purchase 10 million Covid vaccine doses this year
Ho Chi Minh City may purchase up to 10 million Covid-19 vaccine doses this year, the municipal People’s Committee stated Monday.
5-10 million vaccine doses would arrive in the city through direct negotiations with manufacturers, without any third party involved. The exact terms of these contracts would be announced in further detail once signed, he added.
So far, the southern metropolis has received nearly a million vaccine doses from the central government.
HCMC’s ongoing Covid-19 vaccination campaign, expected to end June 27, would administer around 200,000 vaccine shots a day across 650 checkpoints. About half would be given to workers and managers at industrial parks and high-tech areas to ensure an uninterrupted production chain, amounting to around 340,000 people.
By the time the campaign ends, around 6 percent of the HCMC population would have received Covid-19 vaccine shots, said Deputy Director of the Municipal Department of Health, Nguyen Hoai Nam.
“The city would strive to secure enough vaccine doses to cover two thirds of the population, amounting to around seven million people, this year,” Nam said.
Vietnam’s mass Covid-19 vaccination campaign since March has inoculated more than 2.4 million shots, fully vaccinated 121,683 people, using a Covid-19 vaccine by AstraZeneca, which requires two shots. The country aims to secure 150 million vaccine doses to cover 70 percent of its population this year, VNExpress reported.
