Vietnam H1N1 testing institute stretched thin

With the only H1N1 testing facility in South Viet Nam badly overloaded, test results and treatment are being delayed.

HCMC’s Pasteur Institute is receiving up to 1,000 samples a figure revealed to be way above the testing capacity of around 300 by Director General Tran Ngoc Huu at a meeting on Thursday 17^th of September.

 

The meeting, which was attended by health ministry officials and health department officials from 20 southern provinces, was arranged in order to discuss ways to combat the flu’s spread.

 

Huu said the delays of up to four days meant by the time hospitals received the results it was already too late to administer antiviral drug Tamiflu.

 

A suggestion that the ministry imports quick test toolkits were dismissed by Nguyen Huy Nga, director general of the ministry’s Preventive Health and Environment Department, saying such toolkits could not give exact results, with an accuracy rate of just 50 to 60 per cent.

 

The ministry is also yet to accept home treatment for influenza A (H1N1) virus patients, Nga said in response to HCMC’s proposal aimed at lessening the burden on local hospitals.

 

He explained such a move would be made only when demand for treatment exceeds hospital capacity.

 

Dr. Nguyen Thanh Dung of the HCMC Tropical Diseases Hospital said his hospital was now only admitting patients who are already confirmed to be positive for H1N1 while Huu revealed swine flu patients from 20 southern provinces and cities now account for 75-85 per cent of the country’s tally.

 

As of Thursday, Viet Nam had recorded 5,961 H1N1 infection cases. Six have died, while 4,593 have been discharged after already making a full recovery.

 

Hospitals have also been encouraged to set up their own teams equipped to examine, test and treat H1N1 cases as demand increases. Meanwhile the closing of schools would remain a decision for local authorities.

 

Elsewhere, however at a meeting on the same day in the city, Le Truong Giang – vice director of HCMC’s health department, said the southern metro now is not in favor of shutting down schools to combat the epidemic.

 

Giang also rejected the need to use temperature measuring devices to detect people with fever, saying it was estimated that only 60 percent of H1N1-positive cases are accompanied with fever.

 

In addition, long lines of people waiting to have their body temperature tested can also add to the risk of infection spread.

 

Hand-foot-mouth disease claims infant

 

The HCMC Children’s Hospital No.2 has reported that a 17-month-old infant with hand, foot and mouth disease from Dong Nai Province died on Thursday, September 17^th  – a day after being admitted in a critical condition.

 

Doctors noted that in this instance there were no small red spots that usually signified that the disease has reached critical phase.

 

Several city doctors have recently expressed concern over complications arising from the spread of swine flu alongside diseases like dengue fever and hand, foot and mouth which have increased unexpectedly.

 

VietNamNet/TN

 

 

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