Severe Covid-19 cases increase, BA.5 variant dominates in HCMC

Recently, the number of Covid-19 cases in Ho Chi Minh City is on an increasing trend. In the past week, Ho Chi Minh City recorded an average of 144 new cases per day, 10 cases higher than last week’s average.

Correspondingly, the number of new cases increased, the number of hospitalizations and the number of severe cases also tended to increase, with an average of 35 severe cases per day, compared with the average of 18 cases last week. There are currently 7 severe cases requiring invasive mechanical ventilation in hospitals.

According to a report from the Department of Health of Ho Chi Minh City, through a survey at the Hospital for Tropical Diseases in Ho Chi Minh City in the last week of July, the number of Covid-19 cases in the area is on a slight increase. In which, the number of infections with variant BA.5 dominates with 80% of the total cases. Other variants such as BA.2, BA.4, BA.1 account for a small percentage.

This result was performed on 30 inpatients and people who came for testing at the Hospital for Tropical Diseases in Ho Chi Minh City, coordinated by the Oxford University Clinical Research Unit (OUCRU) to sequence viral genes from July 14 to July 30.

Accordingly, up to 24 patients infected with sub-variant BA.5 (accounting for 80%), 4 patients infected with sub-variant BA.2 (accounting for 14%) and each variant BA.1 and BA.4 had 1 patient (accounting for 3%).

In Ho Chi Minh City, the number of new cases increased, the number of hospitalizations and the number of severe cases also tended to increase, with an average of 35 severe cases per day, compared with the average of 18 cases last week. Photo: BVCC

According to Mr. Nguyen Van Vinh Chau, Deputy Director of the Department of Health of Ho Chi Minh City, BA.5 is assessed to have a faster spread rate than previous strains such as BA.1, BA.2… In terms of virulence and pathogenicity severe, so far there is no evidence to confirm higher BA.5.

Omicron’s BA.5 strain is assessed to be more resistant to antibodies, meaning that if you have been infected with Covid-19 before, there is still a possibility of infection with the BA.5 variant. Most patients develop cold and flu-like symptoms with BA.5 infection.

According to the Department of Preventive Medicine, the new strain has the ability to spread 12% faster than BA.2. It is forecasted that in the coming time, the country may record more new mutated infections and the number of cases will increase again, causing the number of hospitalizations and severe cases to increase.

The districts with the number of new Covid-19 cases increased in the past 21 days are District 10, 12, Binh Thanh and Nha Be.

Currently, Ho Chi Minh City has injected about 22.8 million doses, of which the first dose is more than 8.5 million doses, the second dose is more than 7.6 million doses, the additional dose was 687,000 doses, the third dose was more than 4.6 million doses and the fourth dose was more than 1.2 million doses.

@ Saigon Tiep Thi

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