The Ministry of Health yesterday asked localities to maintain drastic measures to prevent the spread of hand-foot-mouth (HFM) disease, which saw a 10-fold year-on-year increase in the first five months this year.

Deputy Health Minister Nguyen Thi Xuyen made the request at an on-line meeting on strengthening HFM disease prevention.

It was predicted that HFM infection and fatality rates would likely go up in the coming months if local authorities did not keep up with intervention measures, Xuyen stressed.

The ministry's Preventive Medicine Department reported nearly 46,300 cases of HFM in 63 provinces and cities nation-wide since the beginning of 2011, including 27 fatalities.

The fatality rate rose 1.7 times against the same period last year, said department deputy director Tran Thanh Duong.

Duong added that the disease could spread via an enterovirus, through digestion or direct contact. High prevalence in Viet Nam and neighbouring countries, especially of the dangerous subtype EV71 virus, would increase the risk of fatality.

According to the department, all HFM fatality cases were recorded among under-five years old children, of which more than 85 per cent were under-three. Nearly 89 per cent were killed by the subtype EV71 virus.

The health sector asked provinces and cities to put forward communication tasks to strengthen community awareness on disease prevention, especially amongst mothers and child care givers in provinces with a high prevalence HFM infection.

Hai Phong City has had the highest infection rate at 199 cases per 100,000 people. An Giang ranks top in the country's list of provinces with the highest fatality rate, with seven people killed by the disease.

"Early detection and treatment of HFM cases by advanced medical technologies would be the best way to save patients' lives," said director of the National Tropical Diseases Hospital Nguyen Van Kinh.

Local examination and treatment units where there are not enough appropriate medical facilities should immediately transfer serious cases to higher levels in order to minimise fatalities, he said.

Treatment units should have a private area for HFM disease treatment and limit the number of people seeing patients to keep the disease from spreading, according to Kinh.

VNA