The Ministry of Health has proposed continuing to keep COVID-19 in Group A of infectious disease, not an endemic disease in its latest draft on COVID-19 prevention and control measures in the new situation. The ministry said that most countries in the world are in a state of unstable cases and deaths, with an erratic increase and decrease trend when new variants of the SARS-CoV-2 virus appear. At the same time, acquired immunity has not been stable for a long time and decreases over time.

In Vietnam, more than 9 million new cases were reported in the past seven months. Cases of sub variants BA.4 and BA.5 have been recorded and began to account for a large proportion in southern provinces while the rates of booster shot vaccination and vaccination among children were low in some localities.

The rise in new cases could cause overload of the health system, particularly in the context of other diseases such as influenza type A and dengue fever now entering peak season and the risk of new infectious diseases like monkeypox.

At the same time, the Ministry suggested step by step easing pandemic prevention and control measures in a flexible manner.

Source: VOV5