Ho Chi Minh City outlines scenarios for coping with COVID-19

The press conference on the COVID-19 situation in Ho Chi Minh City.

At a press conference on October 25, Deputy Director of the Health Department Nguyen Van Vinh Chau said that the city’s overall risk is medium, but the new cases are still rated as high risk.

With new infections remaining high, the city still maintains response measures for a high-risk level and has outlined four treatment scenarios for an expected 100,000 new cases per week.

Under the first scenario, if new infections are low, cases with no or mild symptoms will be treated at home while more severe cases will be admitted to Field Hospital 16.

The Hospital for Tropical Diseases, the Tu Du Hospital and the Children’s Hospital will also receive COVID-19 patients for treatment.

If new infections are at the medium level, the field hospitals 13 and 16 will be put into use, along with Hung Vuong Hospital and district hospitals.

In the third scenario, if new cases are high, the city will use the field hospitals 13, 14 and 16 and the ICU centres at the Cho Ray, Military 175 and Tropical Diseases hospitals.

Three children’s hospitals, Tu Du Hospital and Hung Vuong Hospital will also be called into service in this situation.

In the case that the number of new cases are very high, Ho Chi Minh City will mobilise all hospitals and establish additional field hospitals with 300-500 beds each in its districts.

The total number of treatment beds will be around 16,000-19,000, including 6,500 oxygen beds and 2,000 ICU beds.

Source: NDO