Deputy Head of the HCMC Steering Committee for Covid-19 Prevention and Control and Economic Recovery, Pham Duc Hai speaks at the conference.
As of 6 pm on February 23, HCMC recorded 524,561 new Covid-19 cases, including 927 imported cases. Around 2,171 patients are being treated, including 144 children under 16, 44 severe patients who are on ventilators and 10 people are monitored on ECMO machines.
On February 23, the number of patients hospitalized with Covid-19 was 567 while there were a further 153 recoveries and zero coronavirus death.
By February 23, the city had injected 8,113,185 first doses of Covid-19 vaccines, 7,324,993 second doses, 669,904 booster shots and 4, 018,403 third shots.
Protecting children's lives and health comes first. A campaign caring for children, especially those with underlying medical conditions at high risk from the virus, has been launched in order to protect children’s lives and health. The program includes providing the numbers of helplines with medical professionals, offering training courses for teaching staff to handle with students infected with the virus and medical workers to give Covid-19 guidance for home treatment, preparing plans to respond to the steady increase in children with Covid-19, strengthening propaganda against the pandemic, said Mr. Pham Duc Hai.
Chief of the Office of the city Department of Health Nguyen Thi Huynh Mai
The return of students with close contacts and the appearance of the Omicron variant which is spreading faster than the Delta variant have caused a new surge in coronavirus transmission, said Chief of the Office of the city Department of Health Nguyen Thi Huynh Mai.
The Department of Health of HCMC has coordinated with specialists to carry out preparedness planning for hospitals to receive and care for children with Covid-19, and ready to receive children with Covid-19 at three children hospitals featuring more than 450 beds.
According to Deputy Head of the HCMC Market Management Department Nguyen Tien Dat, as of 11:30 am on February 24, petro sales at retail petrol stations of the city back to normal in HCMC.
Regarding petrol price, Deputy Director of the HCMC Department of Industry and Trade Nguyen Nguyen Phuong said that 11 petrol stations have temporarily closed due to the shortage of petroleum products from their distributor.
The Department of Industry and Trade, the Market Management Department, Police Department and Tax Department of the city will conduct inspections and fine businesses for violations.
In addition, the Department of Industry and Trade also announced two hotline numbers for people to inform about petrol stations’ violations, including 0982115717 and 0906778570.
Deputy Director of the HCMC Department of Industry and Trade Nguyen Nguyen Phuong
The Ministry of Health approved three anti Covid-19 drugs containing Molnupiravir for emergency use, including Molravir 400 produced by Boston Vietnam Pharma, Movinavir 200 mg made by Mekophar Chemical Pharmaceutical, and Molnupiravir Stella 400 produced by Stellapharm J.V Co., Ltd. Covid medicines for emergency use have been approved to be sold at pharmacies and drug stores.
In reality, people could not buy Covid antiviral drug Molnupiravir on February 24. Chief of the Office of the city Department of Health Nguyen Thi Huynh Mai said that to get antiviral pills, people will need to take their test results to a doctor or health care provider and get a formal prescription. The Department of Health has proposed the Ministry of Health to give instruction of issuing a prescription of covid-19 medications.
