Health Ministry holds drill on Ebola outbreak

Ho Chi Minh City, August 15 (VNA) – The Health Ministry and the Pasteur Institute in Ho Chi Minh City held a drill on August 14 to get hospitals in the city prepared for a possible Ebola outbreak, which is currently ravaging West Africa, though no case of infection has been reported in Vietnam so far. A stimulated situation was created for a group of people who came home from a business trip in Ebola-hit Liberia and have developed such symptoms as fever, diarrhea, muscle aches, and haemorrhage after 16 days. Head of the Pasteur Institute Phan Trong Lan said the drill is very important, helping the medical staff improve their response capacity. Joining in the event, which is part of a training course on preventive measures against Ebola for health workers in the south, HCM City’s medical staff also learnt how to prevent the deadly virus from spreading in their hospitals as well as the community. At the drill, the Health Ministry also recommended people to promptly inform local authorities and healthcare institutions of any suspect case returning home from outbreak locations. According to the World Health Organisation, Ebola, which is caught by close contact with an infected person through bodily fluids such as sweat, blood and tissue, has killed 1,069 people in the current outbreak, spreading from southern Guinea to Liberia, Sierra Leone and then Nigeria.-VNA