HCMC – The HCMC Department of Health has asked hospitals to review their facilities and equipment and get ready for a scenario in which Covid-19 cases rise to 15,000 and critical Covid-19 patients soar to 500.
Specifically, the HCMC Hospital for Tropical Diseases, Pham Ngoc Thach, Trung Vuong, Thu Duc City and Cho Ray hospitals, the HCMC Children’s Hospital 2 and the HCMC Children’s Hospital were asked to prepare 440 beds for treating Covid-19 patients in critical condition, the local media reported.
In addition, the Can Gio, Cu Chi and Binh Chanh Covid-19 treatment hospitals and the Cu Chi Field Hospital must prepare 60 beds for those having symptomatic Covid.
The plan was aimed at improving the efficiency of treatment and meeting the demand as new daily Covid cases is on the rise.
The Department of Health also told hospitals to train their medical workers in recuperation, infection prevention and control, and Covid diagnosis and treatment. Doctors in city-level hospitals should be dispatched to newly-established Covid treatment facilities.
Early last month, Tang Chi Thuong, deputy director of the municipal Department of Health, said that Covid patients in critical condition accounted for some 3.5% of all the Covid-19 positive cases.
HCMC is treating Covid patients under the three-story tower model that the Ministry of Health had earlier applied to Bac Giang Province. Accordingly, asymptomatic patients are sent to field hospitals, while those with mild symptoms receive treatment at Covid treatment hospitals and those in critical condition are treated at city-level hospitals.
The two field hospitals with 4,000 beds, converted from the dorms of the Vietnam National University HCMC, treat asymptomatic cases and those with mild symptoms.
The city has prepared 10,000 beds for Covid patients.
