Spraying mosquito chemical repellent (Source: VNA)Head of the Health Ministry’s Preventive Medicine Department Tran Dac Phu has requested Ho Chi Minh City to send doctors from centrally-run hospitals to grass-roots clinics as part of effort to reduce patient overcrowding caused by increasing dengue fever cases.
At a meeting with municipal Health Department officials on October 6, Phu also asked the department to adopt new dengue prevention communications as conventional leaflets and posters failed to work.
Besides, communications should go together with calling on the people to join hands with the health sector in the prevention work, he stressed.
The city should give priority to dealing with dengue hot spots, while controlling mosquito larvae at all construction sites across the locality, he suggested.
As of October 1, the city had recorded 10,624 dengue fever cases, up 80 percent from the same period last year, with high prevalences in Binh Tan, Thu Duc, Binh Chanh, Tan Binh and Tan Phu districts.
At present, municipal hospitals admit an average of 600 dengue inpatients per week.
The disease has killed five people, including two children, in the city so far this year.
According to the World Health Organisation, dengue fever is contracted through bites from dengue-infected mosquitoes, causing headaches, fever, exhaustion, severe muscle and joint pain, swollen glands, vomiting and rashes. There is no medication to treat the disease, only to ease the symptoms.
The disease is currently at its peak in Vietnam, with 25 deaths and 40,000 confirmed dengue cases.-VNA
