At the end of July 2021, the COVID-19 situation in Da Nang turned complicated and unpredictable with the number of new positive cases acquired in the community continuously on an upward trend. In light of this tough fact, the municipal authorities, especially the Steering Board for COVID-19 Prevention and Control, have made unprecedented decisions to soon cut off infection chains as well as detect and isolate as many active cases as possible from the community in a prompt fashion.

The Da Nang leaders have focused on giving drastic and timely directions to repel the pandemic. Here is an image of Da Nang Party Committee Secretary Nguyen Van Quang (left) pays an inspection trip to a mobile sales point organised by the municipal Police Department on August 28. Photo: T.HUY

Given the right and timely policies and decisions along with the high involvement of the whole political system, the high consensus of the people, the support of business community, the current COVID-19 wave in Da Nang has been controlled, thus paving the way to advance towards a new normal as observed currently.

COVID-19 prevention and control is a top priority

Under the strict guidance of the municipal leaders, COVID-19 prevention and control was identified as the first and most important priority task needed fulfilling with the spirit of “fighting against the pandemic like fighting against the enemy”.

Particularly, on July 30, the city recorded 68 cases of COVID-19, of which 10 were acquired in the community. According to the local healthcare sector, at that time, 25 infection chains were documented across the city, including very high-risk ones which were linked to patients in Nai Hien Dong Ward, Son Tra District and the Da Son slaughterhouse.

Addressing a meeting on July 30 held by the Da Nang Steering Board for COVID-19 Prevention and Control, municipal Party Committee Secretary Nguyen Van Quang emphasizsed, "The goal of the city is to bring the COVID-19 wave under control at the soonest. Therefore, more drastic and effective measures must be taken to curb the virus spread”.

The Da Nang administration issued Directive No. 05/CT-UBND regarding the practice of social distancing citywide from 6:00pm on July 31 with the application of measures tougher than those prescribed in Directive No. 16/CT-TTg dated March 31, 2020 of the Prime Minister, including a ban on some unnecessary activities in certain timeframes.

Notably, on August 14, the municipal government adopted Decision 2788/QD-UBND featuring the ‘stay-at-home’ mandate applied to the city’s entire population which came into force at 8:00am on August 16 with unprecedented curbs with the spirit of “shelter in place”.

In the first 7 days of the practice of the ‘stay-at-home’ mandate, Da Nang discovered 969 COVID-19 cases, of which 289 were in Hai Chau District, 233 in Cam Le District, 183 in Thanh Khe District, 83 in Son Tra District, 82 in Ngu Hanh Son District, 49 in Lien Chieu District and 48 in Hoa Vang District. These figures showed a fact that Hai Chau, Thanh Khe and Cam Le were the heaviest-hit districts at that challenging time.

Through mass testing rollouts, a series of COVID-19 hotspots were recorded, and especially, the number of active cases detected from narrow alley-located houses was more than those with facades onto large streets.

The number of COVID-19 cases which once went up to 202 cases/day in August, sharply decreased to an average of 2 - 5 cases/day in September, and only one case/day at the beginning of October. Local medical staff take samples for COVID-19 testing from household representatives in Hai Chau District during the ‘stay-at-home’ period. Photo: LE HUNG, Graphics: TUYET ANH

Some alley-based hotspots such as K524 and K515 Hoang Dieu, K354 and K488 Trung Nu Vuong in Hai Chau District, and K72 Dinh Tien Hoang and K327 Nguyen Phuoc Nguyen in Thanh Khe District were recorded with high case numbers. In particular, about 200 cases were acquired in narrow, highly populous alleys along Tran Cao Van Street.

In a prompt fashion, residents were evacuated to safe places from some narrow alleys and densely-populated areas which were classified as ‘red zones’ where many infections were logged in Cam Le, Thanh Khe and Hai Chau districts, an effective, timely and proactive move to stamp out the further coronavirus spread.

It can be affirmed that, thanks to the strict deployment of the principle of ‘stay-at-home’ mandate to the highest level, the city has basically achieved the COVID-19 containment goals. It is worth praising that infection chains were completely cut off on a large scale, thereby timely detecting and removing a large number of infections from the community.

Great unity and high consensus

In order to make important and unprecedented decisions as above mentioned, the Standing Board of the municipal Party Committee has convened many important extended meetings.

On spotlight of each meeting were intensive discussions about many issues related to pandemic prevention and control, social security, production stability and the supply of goods. Above all, the health and safety of the people was still the top priority.

Besides, the local authorities regularly made inspection trips and extended words of great encouragement to functional forces on duty at COVID-19 quarantine checkpoints, community-based COVID-10 task forces, food suppliers and businesses operating under the “3-on-the-spot” (on-site working, on-site dining and on-site resting) approach.

Reporting by P.CHUNG, L. HUNG, N. PHU – Translating by ANH THU