Minister of Health: Disease prevention must be top priority

On the morning of June 11, under the chairmanship of Minister Nguyen Thi Kim Tien, the Ministry of Health held an online conference with more than 700 points nationwide to deploy epidemic and disease prevention, vaccination and vaccination safety in 2019.

Scene at Nghe An bridge. Photo: My Ha

According to the Ministry of Health's forecast, in the coming time, the epidemic situation still has many potential complicated developments, especially hand, foot and mouth disease, measles, and dengue fever.

Meanwhile, disease prevention and control work is still facing many difficulties because diseases such as dengue fever and hand, foot and mouth disease do not have specific treatments or vaccines.

In some localities, there are times and places where people have not really taken drastic measures, leaving it up to the health sector; some people have not cooperated with the government and the health sector in disease prevention and control, have not been proactive in implementing personal hygiene and environmental sanitation measures, eliminating mosquito larvae, and have not taken their children to get vaccinated on schedule according to the health sector's instructions.

On the Nghe An side, there was comrade Nguyen Xuan Hong - Deputy Director of the Department of Health, representatives of hospitals, medical centers, and vaccination facilities. Districts and cities also had connecting points participating in this conference. Photo: My Ha

Speaking at the conference, Minister Nguyen Thi Kim Tien added: This time of unusually hot weather and heavy rain has increased the risk of disease spreading. Therefore, the health sector needs to be proactive in preventing disease, in which prevention comes before treatment.

To do this, the Minister of Health requires proactive communication on disease prevention, vaccination safety and the participation of the entire political system. At the same time, attention must be paid to epidemic prevention and vaccination.

The Minister of Health also requested that the entire health sector pay special attention to treatment, especially prevention and safety in hospitals, to avoid the risk of cross-infection.

Children need to be vaccinated on schedule. Photo: My Ha

In addition, medical facilities also need to increase their responsibility, qualifications, and expertise in diagnosing and treating diseases. At the same time, screening, classifying, routing, isolating in treatment... to reduce overload, avoid making milder cases more serious, and not let overload cause public panic.

The health sector also needs to comprehensively innovate, overcome limitations in facilities and the shabby situation in hospitals, strictly implement vaccination procedures, design spacious and airy patient waiting rooms at commune level, and have communication facilities at the terminal...

To proactively prevent epidemics, at the conference, delegates also received technical instructions on monitoring, handling and preventing dengue fever and hand, foot and mouth disease; Instructions on updating treatment regimens for dengue fever patients in children and treatment regimens for dengue fever patients in adults; Instructions on safe vaccination and instructions on handling and providing emergency care for post-vaccination complications.