Mr. Binh at the meeting (Photo: SGGP)
The director made the statement at a meeting this morning adding that the southern metropolis has recorded 640 cases of Covid-19 so far. The city must drastically be more determined in carrying measures against the pandemic in the next nine days.
After 15 days of social distancing rules, the city authorities will have an overall assessment to take more preventative measures to suit the actual situation, creating conditions for restoring production and improving business activities.
Of 640 cases, 268 are recoveries while 371 patients being treated and one patient succumbed to the disease. In addition, Ho Chi Minh City-based Hospital for Tropical Diseases is currently treating three severe Covid-19 patients transferred from the General Hospital in the Mekong Delta Province of An Giang and two from Long An Regional General Hospital.
Some 362 cases of Covid-19 have been announced related to the outbreak at the religious mission located in Go Vap District from May 26 to now.
According to the results of SARS-CoV-2 gene sequencing of the first seven patients in the outbreak related to the mission, the Indian variant, B.1.617.2 is the culprit of the outbreak.
The clusters linked to the religious mission include five-star Sheraton hotel with 12 cases who are chef and waiters and waitresses; Trung Nguyen coffee shop at 104 Phổ Quang with 34 cases; KID TOWN kindergarten, the rental house at 80/59/80A Duong Quang Ham Street in Go Vap District.
Prof. Dr. Nguyen Tan Binh, the cluster relating to the religious mission has spread rapidly recently because religious activities were organized in an enclosed space with many people gathering without donning facemasks.
Health workers collect samples for test (Photo: SGGP)
The disease continues to spread rapidly in the community because many of them are employees in high-rise buildings and enclosed environments with poor ventilation while the new Covid-19 variant combining characteristics of the two existing variants first found in the UK and India spreads quickly in the air.
Due to favorable factors, the epidemic broke out strongly in the early days, peaking at 70 cases a day. Thanks to Ho Chi Minh City's drastic and timely epidemic prevention measures, it has seen a decline in coronavirus cases daily; cases of Covid-19 reduced to 43 cases and 28 cases on June 1 and 2 respectively. This is a good sign, proving the city has well done in tracing measure, said Professor Binh.
According to Dr. Binh, from May 31, Covid-19 positive cases have been recorded in centralized isolation areas that had at least one negative test before. This rate is increasing gradually compared to the rate of positive cases that have not been isolated. This shows that the city has been gradually controlled.
Although some cases of Covid-19 without tracking sources of infection have been detected in the community, the city is applying the social distancing measure; hence, the risk of contact is low.
Contacts F1 have not been declared or declared late, so the health sector is continuing tracing such as the outbreak in the SAMCO building in District 1. Accordingly, the city must carry out different levels of ongoing social distancing in the next nine days, said Dr. Binh.
