It is necessary to identify four major contents: the children under the age of five are those with a high chance contracting hand-foot-mouth disease; patients contract hand-foot-mouth disease through the digestive system, so eating and living cleanly and washing personal belongings frequently are a must; there hasn’t been a special medical treatment for hand-foot-mouth disease, so the only way now is to take preventive measures; hot and wet climate heightens the risk for this disease, added Nhan.

These are very important contents that need disseminating to every citizen to help them prevent hand-foot-mouth disease most effectively.

From now to late 2011, households with the children under the age of five will be provided with antibacterial soap, stressed Deputy Prime Minister.

All parents are required to wash their hands thoroughly with soap and pay special attention to hygiene conditions in the places where their children live and play as a way to prevent hand-foot-mouth disease.

In addition to the treatment methods being applied in Children's Hospital 1 and 2, there must be the most effective hand-foot-mouth disease prevention procedures for provincial and district hospitals.

Making an evaluation of the hand-foot-mouth epidemic in Vietnam and around the world, Dr., Director of Bureau of Health, and Chief of the Supervision Committee Nguyen Van Binh said that it is happening complicatedly in some countries in the world. For instance, Singapore has 15,254 cases of hand-foot-mouth disease and its disease rate per 100,000 residents is 324.5.

There have been 317,461 cases of hand-foot-mouth disease in Japan and the disease rate per 100,000 residents is 251.

90,189 cases of hand-foot-mouth disease in Vietnam have been reported. 153 victims died and the disease rate per 100,000 residents is 100.8.

At the present, ten provinces and cities in the country with the highest disease rate per 100,000 residents are Quang Ngai, Dong Thap, Ba Ria - Vung Tau, Dong Nai, Ben Tre, Hoa Binh, Tay Ninh, Soc Trang, Vinh Long, and Kon Tum.

10 provinces and cities with the highest mortality rate are Ninh Thuan, Bac Lieu, Thua Thien Hue, Hau Giang, Binh Duong, Dong Nai, Long An, Binh Dinh, Lam Dong, and Ca Mau.

Source: VNA, Translated by Duy Minh