Focused on highlighting the National Hand-Foot-Mouth Campaign, the Ministry of Health organised several activities to increase awareness in people of the highly infectious disease, in Ho Chi Minh City on March 24.
Nguyen Tan Binh, deputy director of the Department of Health in HCMC, said that by March 21 the city had recorded more than 1,500 hand-foot-mouth cases, mostly of children less than five years of age.
At present, about 200 children are admitted each week for treatment. So far one child has succumbed to the disease this year.
The People’s Committee of HCMC has ordered the Department of Health to implement measures to tackle the disease by increasing awareness of personal hygiene in communities, rented houses in industrial parks and in pre-schools.
Big hospitals such as Children Hospital No.1 and 2 and the Tropical Disease Hospital will have to provide training to medical workers in suburban hospitals and provinces.
