Minister Nguyen Thanh Long: Many localities build Covid-19 epidemic scenarios lower than reality

At the online conference and training on strengthening treatment and intensive care in Covid-19 prevention at the Ministry of Health's bridge in Ho Chi Minh City, on the morning of August 2, Minister Nguyen Thanh Long emphasized: "This fourth wave of Covid-19 has developed rapidly, occurring over a large area, in a short period of time, the number of cases has increased very high. In this outbreak in key epidemic areas, it is very difficult to bring the number of infections to 0. Therefore, we must determine to continue the epidemic prevention work quickly, strongly and persistently."

Nghe An medical staff take samples for testing from people in Cham Puong village, Luong Minh commune, Tuong Duong district. Photo: Thanh Cuong

The Minister also emphasized that localities need to seriously pay attention to epidemic prevention work to avoid panic and passivity when the epidemic occurs on a large scale.

Accordingly, through checking the practical work of epidemic prevention in many localities and listening to reports, there are many localities with good methods in epidemic prevention, but there are also many localities in building epidemic prevention scenarios in the area that have not taken into account all possible situations, even though the Ministry of Health has warned many times that the Delta virus strain will spread strongly, widely, be difficult to control and last long.

"In most localities, the prepared scenarios are lower than reality. Some localities prepare high scenarios but do not take into account reality. They are still not well prepared for epidemic prevention" - Minister Nguyen Thanh Long assessed.

In particular, some localities have not yet promoted the "4 on-site" motto in epidemic prevention. In this fourth wave of the epidemic, when the epidemic occurs, it usually only lasts for a short time, develops quickly, and has many infected cases, so it is necessary to prepare epidemic prevention capacity to proactively respond to the epidemic.

According to Minister Nguyen Thanh Long, the treatment of Covid-19 must be stratified appropriately. In particular, in the medical work, it is necessary to pay close attention to treatment and testing. These are two issues that are difficult to respond to given the current infection rate of the epidemic in localities. Therefore, localities need to pay close attention to the response capacity in treatment and testing.

"Treatment is a matter of special concern at present. Currently, the response capacity of localities in treating Covid-19 still depends mainly on existing facilities, but in reality, the treatment system has not met the requirements," said Minister Nguyen Thanh Long.

The Ministry of Health has stratified treatment according to the "3-tier tower" model, according to which the first tier should not choose medical facilities but should choose F1 isolation facilities to deploy the establishment of health monitoring sites. For asymptomatic patients allocated to treatment on this tier, not much medical staff is needed. After 7 days of treatment, if the test is negative, the CT viral load index > 30, they need to be discharged from the hospital.

If the patient has moderate symptoms, he/she will be admitted to a district-level health facility (2nd floor of the treatment tower). At this treatment level, there must be a central oxygen and oxygen system, and medical staff must be equipped with HFNC ventilators to be ready to treat the patient when needed.

If the patient's condition worsens, they should be taken immediately to the third floor, the highest treatment floor. On this treatment floor, localities must set up an intensive care treatment area.

“Treatment stratification is very important, including the role of regulating patients to appropriate floors to avoid bringing less seriously ill patients to higher floors, avoiding patients at risk of death on the first and second floors. Coordination, patient transport, and patient reception must be carried out methodically,” Minister Nguyen Thanh Long noted.

According to the Minister of Health, the point of view is to get F0 out of the community as quickly as possible, so localities must prepare for treatment so that when an epidemic occurs, they will not be passive or confused. To prepare for effective treatment, the human resource factor is extremely important.

The Ministry of Health has issued a document requesting localities to mobilize the private health system to participate in epidemic prevention. Both public and private health must work together to fight the epidemic. Right now, even localities that have not yet had an epidemic need to immediately review human resources who know how to use ventilators and retrain them across the entire network.

Localities should also review the number of human resources used for treatment floor 2 and the number of human resources used for treatment floor 3 to coordinate if necessary.

In particular, the issue of preparing medical equipment and supplies for epidemic prevention and control such as ventilators, oxygen, medicines, and consumables is also an issue that needs special attention.

Minister Nguyen Thanh Long requested that localities must maximize the “4 on-site” measures, with the Central Government only providing support in necessary situations for the central intensive care centers in the area. In preparing logistics for the treatment of Covid-19 patients, the Ministry of Health requested that all medical facilities treating Covid-19 patients must be prepared with oxygen and ventilators.

"These are two essential factors in treatment, so the Ministry of Health had to issue several documents to urge this issue. We do not lack oxygen, but many places do not have oxygen tanks, making transportation difficult. Therefore, medical facilities must immediately review and prepare plans immediately" - Minister Nguyen Thanh Long requested.