Locking down Thuan An city and Tan Uyen town to quell the pandemic
Information at the meeting, Mr. Duong Chi Nam - Deputy Director of Health Environment Management Agency, Ministry of Health said that the pandemic situation in two localities of Thuan An city and Tan Uyen town is still very complicated. If there is no resolute and stronger solutions, it will lead to overcrowding and high death rate.
In the second large-scale testing underway, it shows that Thuan An City and Tan Uyen Town both have the rate of F0 increased very high, especially in Thuan An (the number of cases detected through the first large-scale testing is less than 2%, the second time is 12.7%; the outbreak area in some boarding houses is up to 15%). In Tan Uyen town, the cases in the large-scale testing for the first time is less than 1.2%, the second time is 3.6%; the pandemic is complicated, if there is no drastic measures, it will be like Thuan An's current situation.
Explaining the reason for the high number of cases, Mr. Duong Chi Nam said: "The first testing was implemented slowly, it took 12 days to complete and return to the second testing, so the number of F0 cases continuously multiplied exponentially; the density of workers in boarding houses, especially in Thuan An area is very crowded, the rooms are close together, the area is narrow, some boarding houses use shared toilets, easy to cross-contaminate in the boarding houses. The supervision of the implementation of Directive 16 may not be really strict or there are not enough supervisory forces, leading to not ensuring the separation of house from house, person from person, especially workers' boarding houses".
Mr. Nam emphasized: "Thuan An City is right next to Thu Duc City and District 12 of Ho Chi Minh City, so it is affected and infected very deeply and widely, so it is necessary to persevere and decisively use all measures, including very strong measures".
Mr. Duong Chi Nam - Deputy Director of Health Environment Management Agency, Ministry of Health speaks at the meeting
Dr. MD. Tran Quang Canh - Chairman of the Council of the Hai Duong Medical Technical University said: "The strategy is still distancing, quarantine; testing. Adequate supplies should be prepared to meet the sampling schedule. Coordinating between local authorities and sampling units. In order to take samples and thoroughly avoid infection, local authorities need to organize locations and mobilize all people to take samples, then ensure that there is no more F0 in the community."
The solution proposed by experts of the Ministry of Health at the meeting was to strengthen Directive 16+ for Thuan An city and Tan Uyen town until August 30. Continuing to ask people not to leave their homes from 18:00 the previous day to 06:00 the next day throughout Thuan An city, Tan Uyen town. Mobilizing military and police forces to continuously patrol to ensure that "house is separated from house, person is separate from person", paying special attention to boarding houses.
Strictly managing the barricades, stretching the line to separate the green-yellow-red zone, locking down the outbreak in the red zone, "no inside out, no outside in". Supplying food directly, selling essential foods at the "red zone outbreak".
Particularly for Thuan An, if it is necessary to deploy more strongly, asking people not to leave their homes and "temporarily suspend all activities" in the area for 1-2 weeks. Only people on duty of pandemic prevention and control, emergency care, medical examination and treatment, ensuring to serve the people's essential needs (postal services, distribution of food, foodstuffs, supply services of electricity, water, information, telecommunications, civil servants, etc.) can go out.
At the same time, promoting large-scale testing many times to detect new outbreaks, separating F0 in outbreaks and communities. Conducting testing every 3 days in the entire Thuan An city, Tan Uyen town (test 3 times in a row, without stopping, without delay). Sampling force in Thuan An city is expected to be 400 groups, 50 backup groups; Tan Uyen Town to be 385 groups.
Focusing on treatment, expanding tier 2
At the meeting, experts also discussed with localities about the collection and treatment of patients.
For the situation where there are too many F0, must be quarantined at home, the proposed solution: Establishing a rapid response group to monitor and treat F0 at home, prepare support materials; making a list of F0 at home with a medical history to monitor treatment, a network of management collaborators to update information regularly; Hotline for F0; developing guidelines to treating F0 at home, free pack of medicine. Ensuring security and order, providing food for F0.
Assoc. Prof. Dr. MD. Nguyen Lan Hieu - Director of Hanoi Medical University Hospital proposes solutions to treat Covid-19 patients
In order not to overload and put pressure on treatment facilities, Assoc. Prof. Dr. MD. Nguyen Lan Hieu - Director of Hanoi Medical University Hospital suggested localities to check patients eligible for hospital discharge, gather quarantine areas to bring them to a large quarantine area, expand the treatment area of tier 2 to focus on treating severe cases. He noted that localities focusing on treatment from the beginning must be fully equipped with medicine and oxygen to prevent the death of patients on tier 1, and be sure of the treatment on tier 1 and tier 2. The treatment and hospital transfer must be closely coordinated between all levels.
For Thuan An city, there are currently 33 quarantine and treatment areas for tier-1 patients, requiring the locality to check patients after 7 days of negative test results and then send them home for monitoring to gather the remaining 20 quarantine areas. Expanding the tier-2 treatment, adding 96 beds. Thuan An needs to coordinate in transferring patients to other localities when the green zone localities have empty hospital beds.
Assoc. Prof. Dr. MD. Nguyen Lan Hieu suggested that Tan Uyen Town apply the same treatment model as Thuan An City, focus on early treatment for patients in quarantine areas, and plan to discharge patients early with eligible patients.
For Ben Cat Town, immediately in this week, focusing on expanding 20 treatment beds for tier-2 patients. Bau Bang district has a low number of patients, it is necessary to shrink the quarantine areas to bring medical forces and doctors to the field hospital.
Bac Tan Uyen district will act as a buffer zone for aid and support for Tan Uyen town.
Chairman of the Provincial People's Committee Vo Van Minh speaks at the meeting
Speaking to conclude, Chairman of the Provincial People's Committee Vo Van Minh asked localities to thoroughly grasp the solutions proposed by experts of the support working Group of the Ministry of Health. There are two major issues need to be focused on are the testing for each red zone and green zone. For treatment, localities are proactive about oxygen and medicine for treatment. Concentrating testing force, by all means to determine F0, having timely solutions to reduce death rate. Requesting 02 localities of Tan Uyen town and Thuan An city to take strong measures to thoroughly control the pandemic. The province will have specific instructions.
Reported by Yen Nhi - Translated by Nguyen Trang