WHO Representative praises Vietnam’s COVID-19 fight

“Although Vietnam is a country with large, ageing population and lower-middle-income
economy, and close to China with land crossing borders with
multiple countries, it has been managing the COVID-19 outbreaks effectively, keeping the number
of cases, including deaths, relatively lower than those of other countries,” he
said 

The
cumulative number of confirmed cases per 1 million population remains
about 16 so far; and the cumulative number of deaths per 1
million population is about 0.4 so far, he cited.

“These are the lowest figures among the 15 countries with
more than 90 million population,” he said. 

Though Vietnam has been enjoying the a period in “peace” with no reported
cases of community transmission, he noted that the COVID-19 pandemic is
accelerating its resurgence in many countries and imported cases are being
reported almost every day. New community transmission cases in the country can
happen anytime at any place, he warned.

In this context, Vietnam needs to set dual objectives of disease control
and economic development, the so called “a safe co-existence with COVID-19”.

He recommended that while doing economic activities, the country should
remain vigilant. “Everybody should practice basic infection prevention measures
at their daily life such as hand washing, mask wearing, physical distancing and
avoiding places with high risk of transmission – crowds, closed spaces and
close-contact settings,” he said.

The health sector should be able to detect any new suspected outbreak as early
as possible and apply measures to suppress new outbreak if it happens, he added.

Taking COVID-19 tests for residents (Photo:VNA)

Regarding COVID-19 vaccines, Park stated that as of January 19, 237
candidate vaccines are under development globally. Of these, 64 are either
under clinical trial, and some of them have been in phase 3 or being authorized
for emergency use in some countries. Some vaccines are under review of WHO
emergency use listing.  

WHO recognises
Vietnam’s active participation in this global effort with a candidate vaccine
being developed in the country, and acknowledges one of them have already
started clinical trial phase 1 and others are also shown well progress to start
the clinical trial soon. This is really impressive, he said. 

“It is a
pride of biotechnology in the country,” he asserted.

One year since the first case of COVID-19 confirmed in the country (January 23,
2020-2021), thanks to the effective implementation of key measures in the
prevention and control of the panemic, the number of infections in Vietnam
stand at only 1,548, including 35 deaths./.