Deputy Minister of Health Nguyen Thanh Long has voiced concern over the complicated development of hand-foot-mouth disease in the coming days if preventive measures are not effectively adopted. To date, all provinces and cities across the country have reported multiple cases of this infectious disease, Lao Dong newspaper reported.

Deputy Prime Minister Vu Duc Dam (wearing glasses, R) speaks to a mother attending to her child infected with hand-foot-mouth disease at a hospital on October 11 in HCMC - PHOTO: VGP

The Ministry of Health asked local authorities to provide guidance, organize campaigns aimed at fighting the spread of the disease and encourage local residents to join efforts to manage the disease. Besides this, healthcare agencies must actively follow up on the disease’s development and map out solutions to quickly detect and address infectious cases.

Data from the General Department of Preventive Medicine, under the ministry, show that the country reported 53,529 infected people during the year up to September, down 25.3% year-on-year. Of these, over 25,800 cases were admitted to hospitals, down some 20% versus the year-ago period, and six people died of the disease in five provinces and cities in the south.

However, HCMC, Hanoi, Long An, Dong Nai, Binh Duong, Danang and Quang Ngai have seen a surging number of hand-foot-mouth patients in recent weeks.

In HCMC, nearly 400 infected people were admitted to hospitals between September 28 and October 4, raising the total number of hand-foot-mouth inpatients in the city to over 4,000 cases in the January-September period, according to the municipal Preventive Medicine Center.

Meanwhile, Pediatrics Hospital in Can Tho City has admitted nearly 500 infected children during the first two weeks of October, doubling the figure of the year-ago period.

Notably, in the Central Highlands province of Gia Lai, the Kindergarten May 1, which is located in Ia Yok Commune, Ia Grai District, had to shut down temporarily to prevent the disease from spreading as up to 27 children had been infected. According to the Ia Grai Health Division, the number of hand-foot-mouth patients is rapidly increasing, amounting to 40 cases at the start of this month, mainly found in the Ia Yok Commune.

Apart from that, Quang Ngai Obstetrics and Pediatrics Hospital in the central region is heavily overloaded due to hand-foot-mouth disease. Statistics from the provincial Center for Disease Control revealed that over 1,300 infected cases have been recorded this year, up twofold against last year’s figure.

As the number of hand-foot-mouth patients is escalating across the country, many hospitals are overloaded and working at full capacity to cope with the disease.

The health ministry has called on the local people, especially mothers, to actively adopt preventive measures in their daily activities, such as washing their hands with soap, sterilizing home appliances regularly and paying attention to personal as well as public hygiene.

SGT