A medical worker prepares a COVID-19 vaccine shot for a resident in Thanh Xuân District, Hà Nội. — VNA/VNS Photo

HÀ NỘI — Prime Minister Phạm Minh Chính on Tuesday asked the defence ministry and 10 northern localities to be prepared to provide support for Hà Nội's COVID-19 prevention and control efforts.

Amid the complicated coronavirus situation, Minister of Defence, chairs of people's committees and secretaries of Party committees of 10 northern provinces and cities Bắc Giang, Vĩnh Phúc, Bắc Ninh, Hải Dương, Hưng Yên, Hải Phòng, Hà Nam, Nam Định, Thái Bình and Hoà Bình to gear up human resources to readily support Hà Nội when necessary, in the tasks of COVID-19 testing, patient treatment and care, contact tracing, and administration of COVID-19 vaccines.

The capital city has recorded 3,614 cases of COVID-19 in the fourth wave of infections (since late April), with nearly 1,600 community cases.

The city has been under strict lockdown for more than two months now, and is still detecting an average of 50 new COVID-19 incidences for the past days, including some cases found through screening of people with suspected symptoms like fever or coughing.

Hà Nội's authorities are determined to test all residents by September 15 to 'filter out' all virus carriers from the community, and have 100 per cent of the population aged 18 and above receive at least one dose of vaccine, however there have been concerns over the feasibility of these goals, due to lack of personnel and vaccine shortage.

It should be noted that at the moment, a large number of medical personnel in Hà Nội, ministry-level bodies in Hà Nội, as well as other provinces and cities across the country, has been deployed to COVID-19 epicentre HCM City and other localities in the southern region to help deal with the severe outbreaks there. — VNS