said medicine czar Tran Dac Phu, senior advisor to the Vietnam Public Health Emergency Operations Center (PHEOC).

Deputy Chairman of the Hanoi People’s Committee Ngo Van Quy speaks at the meeting (Photo: SGGP)

Dr. Phu made the statement at the meeting between the Steering Board for the Covid-19 Prevention and Control and related state competent agencies in Hanoi.

He noted that according to scientists, the virus was found to be particularly persistent in cooler temperatures but the country is relaxing measures against the disease while winter is on its way; therefore, widespread transmission of coronavirus is highly likely to occur.

At the meeting, participants stressed that many people are subjective to the disease; hence they didn’t wear facemasks in public places.

Reporting his inspection tours, Director of the Department of Health in Hanoi Nguyen Khac Hien pointed out that no one in public sport areas wore facemasks but they didn’t receive penalties.

Meantime, Deputy Head of the Department of Health in Hanoi Tran Thi Nhi Ha who lead the second supervision team complained that guards in stations didn’t wear facemasks as they explained to remove facemask for eating.

A representative of the Department of Industry and Trade said that it has directed management boards in supermarket and traditional markets to measure consumers’ temperature and wear facemasks this month when most commercial centers promote consumption.

Since the high possibility of disease occurrence in the winter, Deputy Chairman of the Hanoi People’s Committee Ngo Van Quy emphasized administrations in districts should force people to wear facemasks in public places as well as closely monitor quarantine areas and imported cases.

Supervision teams will continue touring places to check mandatory facemask wearing in hospitals, bus station, commercial centers, supermarkets and traditional markets, he added.

Concerning complaints of a big price difference between Covid-19 test in public medical clinics and private facilities with VND734,000 and VND1.2 million respectively, Deputy Chairman Quy assigned the center for Disease Control in Hanoi to carry out Covid-19 tests in quarantine wards including hotels at the cost of VND734,000; those who want to have private facility tested must pay more. SGGP

Khanh Nguyen

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