A medical worker performs a test on a baby
This is a stressful time. Parents are advised to take care of themselves so they can support their children.
Most of the children who come to medical centers have mild symptoms are indicated for monitoring and treatment at home. Pediatric patients who are indicated for hospitalization often have underlying diseases.
In the Covid-19 screening area, Children's Hospital 1 has operated around the clock to receive children with Covid-19 or suspicious signs. On average, more than 100 patients are admitted per day. Doctor Du Tuan Quy, Head of the Infection Department, said that the hospital has sometimes received more than 500 children for examination.
Similarly, Children's Hospital 2 has seen an increase in the number of children with Covid-19. Out of a total of 400-800 children who come to the infirmary every day, about 80 percent of them have Covid-19, an increase of 4-5 times compared to the time when the children did not go to school.
According to Dr. Truong Huu Khanh, Vice President of Ho Chi Minh City Infectious Diseases Association, advised parents need to calm down and can take care of their children at home, such as giving them plenty of water to drink, taking fever-reducing medicines, anti-vomiting medicines, cough medicines. These symptoms will disappear gradually and most children will get well within 48 hours. Parents can take their children to a clinic nearby their house because the symptoms of Covid-19 are similar to viral fever and upper respiratory infection. Parents should not bring their children to a higher-level hospital, causing overloaded hospitals.
Currently, the hospital has been providing treatment for 140 children with Covid-19, including more than 10 children in severe condition. Children's Hospital 2 has prepared a plan to use beds at the Respiratory Department in case the number of hospitalized children with Covid-19 surges in the near future.
The City Children's Hospital also records 500-600 children with suspicious symptoms every day. According to the hospital Deputy Director Dr. Nguyen Minh Tien, the number of pediatric patients who tested positive for Covid-19 accounted for about 50 percent of the total number of children with suspected symptoms. the City Children's Hospital has arranged more examination tables as well as set up a hotline to support parents to treat children at home...
Although the number of children infected with Covid-19 in Ho Chi Minh City has been skyrocketing in recent days, many parents still hesitate to take their children to medical centers for vaccination. Some parents believed that the Omicron strain causes mild disease in children, letting children get infected naturally is equivalent to a vaccine, so it is not necessary to vaccinate children against Covid-19.
In response to this opinion, Dr. Nguyen Thi Thanh Thuy, Deputy Head of the Department of Children's Health under the Children's Hospital 2, said that the effectiveness of vaccination is much higher than when the body is naturally infected with Covid-19. Vaccines help your immune system fight infections faster and more effectively. When you get a vaccine, it sparks your immune response, helping your body fight off and remember the germ so it can attack it if the germ ever invades again. And since vaccines are made of very small amounts of weak or dead germs, they won’t make you sick.
If the body is naturally infected, the immune system can react in a panic, so the body's defense is limited. At the same time, the ability to remember immunity also fades quickly when it is not built properly. This makes subsequent protection often only equal to or less than a single shot of the vaccine.
In fact, at Children's Hospital 2, some children under 11 years old with Covid-19 had severe symptoms such as convulsions and lung damage. Compared to children over 12 years old who have been vaccinated, the symptoms are milder, the fever is not too high, usually three days after the child has recovered.
Dr. Pham Quang Thai from Central Institute of Hygiene and Epidemiology, said that although at the present time, children with Covid-19 usually have mild symptoms, but it does not mean that children will be safe at a later stage.
Therefore, this age group still needs to be vaccinated against Covid-19. Previously, the World Health Organization (WHO) did not recommend vaccination for ages 5-11, because adults who are at risk have not been covered with vaccines, while vaccine resources are limited. However, now that the vaccine source is more abundant, the coverage rate of the priority group is almost absolute, so vaccination for children is completely appropriate.
According to the Ministry of Health’s guidance, children with chronic and congenital diseases will be vaccinated at general hospitals with pediatrics or at pediatric hospitals. Children who have an anaphylactic reaction to the vaccine or any component in the vaccine are indicated not to receive the vaccine.
