HCMC – HCMC confirmed its first monkeypox case today and reported it to the Health Ministry, said the HCMC Health Department at a briefing about the epidemic situation and key activities of the fourth quarter of 2022.
As part of the briefing, the director of the HCMC Health Department, Tang Chi Thuong, announced the country’s first monkeypox infection.
Early detection and prevention of the outbreak were immediately prioritized by the HCMC Health Department in collaboration with relevant agencies.
Under the guidance of the HCMC Center for Disease Control, supervisors will closely monitor those who enter Vietnam through the border gates to detect suspicious cases.
Prior to the detection, several scenarios were chalked out by HCMC in case of the detection of monkeypox, classified as an emergency by the Government.
Accordingly, drastic handling will be carried out if a suspected case is detected at the border gate. Additionally, medical quarantine officers will examine, collect information and make an epidemiological investigation sheet.
In cases of clinical symptoms and epidemiological factors, patients will be directed to the Hospital for Tropical Diseases or general hospitals with isolation areas for examination and monitoring.
Those with suspicious symptoms can seek advice, screening and diagnostic testing at their nearest district hospital. For testing, hospitals will screen, classify and guide patients and send samples to the Pasteur Institute and Hospital for Tropical Diseases in HCMC.
While waiting for the test results, patients will either self-isolate at home or stay in the hospital’s isolation ward.
The HCMC Hospital for Tropical Diseases was tasked with receiving those with severe symptoms or confirmed monkeypox cases.
The temporary guidance issued by the HCMC Health Department on monkeypox prevention and control states that anyone with symptoms such as fever over 38 degrees Celsius, swollen lymph nodes, headache, muscle pain, back pain or weakness needs to contact the nearest health station.
Within 21 days of receiving a suspected case, the quarantine department and medical staff will collect information and make an epidemiological investigation form.
