Since the Covid-19 outbreak, Pasteur Nha Trang Institute has provided testing support for 11 central provinces and cities to fight the pandemic...
Since the Covid-19 outbreak, Pasteur Nha Trang Institute has provided testing support for 11 central provinces and cities in the fight against the pandemic. Over the 4 waves of Covid-19, Pasteur Nha Trang Institute has provided workforce support for Gia Lai Province and joined 2 missions of the Ministry of Health to help Laos and recently Bac Giang Province.
Volunteering to virus epicenters
With the help of 3 young experts from Pasteur Nha Trang Institute, the RT-PCR testing lab of Bac Giang Obstetrics and Pediatrics Hospital, which has just been put into operation for half a month, has increased its testing capacity to 700 samples from 300 samples per day. According to PhD. Do Thai Hung, Director of Pasteur Nha Trang Institute, as soon as Deputy Minister of Health Nguyen Truong Son notified the need for additional workforce support, 3 cadres of the Department of Microbiology and Immunology named M.A Huynh Kim Mai, Deputy Chief of the department and 2 bachelors in biology named Le Minh Huyen and Truong Tien Dat volunteered to take the mission, beginning on May 21.
On the same day, the group hastened to pack for the working trip, bringing automated extraction devices and biological products to head to Bac Giang Province. The group arrived in Bac Giang on the evening of May 22. Under the close and strict direction of Ministry of Health’s special standing team and local authorities, a RT-PCR testing lab was set up rapidly at the Obstetrics and Pediatrics Hospital, Bac Giang Province. The lab began to operate on May 23, handling 300 samples/ day.
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As testing plays a critical role in pandemic prevention and control, together with speeding up testing progress, experts of Pasteur Nha Trang Institute also directed, provided training and transferred RT-PCR testing techniques to 6 cadres of the Medical Testing Laboratory, the Obstetrics and Pediatrics Hospital in the first drive. Thanks to the support, the Medical Testing Laboratory has increased its capacity to 700 samples/ day, contributing to accelerating testing in Bac Giang.
M.A Huynh Kim Mai, Deputy Chief of the Department of Microbiology and Immunology said, “We are all willing and ready to help control the Covid-19 outbreak in epicenters. The recent wave of Covid-19 in Bac Giang is much more complicated than in that Da Nang, where we were involved in the pandemic control. Therefore, we need to increase our working capacities twice or thrice to be able to get test results sooner. Besides training for 6 cadres of the Obstetrics and Pediatrics Hospital, we have a training plan for more staff to ensure preparedness for high capacity of testing.”
After half a month deployed to Bac Giang, helping testing thousands of samples, the experts of Pasteur Nha Trang Institute have been honored for their high responsibility by leaders of Bac Giang health care sector and especially the Obstetrics and Pediatrics Hospital. The Obstetrics and Pediatrics Hospital’s Medical Testing Laboratory has recently received samples for confirmatory testing from some districts and towns in Bac Giang.
Generation sequencing techniques to be put into use
RT-PCR testing is critical to track and trace Covid-19 to prepare workforce in case of emergency when the outbreak spreads nationwide. In 2020, apart from 19 staff of the Department of Microbiology and Immunology directly got involved in the SASR-CoV-2 confirmatory testing, Pasteur Nha Trang Institute provided testing technique training for many staff in other departments in the institute. The institute has mobilized more than 30 people so far to get involved in the task when needed.
In addition, the institute has boosted the testing capacity to lower-level facilities through technical transfer, training and supply of biological products, chemicals and materials for SARS-CoV-2 confirmatory testing. The institute has provided training and granted testing certificates to more than 90 medical staff and developed 17 SARS-CoV-2 confirmatory testing labs (private and state-owned) in 11 provinces and cities in the central region, helping the cites and cities in pandemic prevention and control under the “4 on-site” motto.
According to PhD. Do Thai Hung, the institute has founded 6 testing teams consisting 2-3 members each, meeting the support for testing and technical transfer for the control of Covid-19 outbreak when required by the Ministry of Health. The institute has invested in Realtime RT-PCR systems with a capacity of 4,000 samples/ day or 40,000 cases/day. Particularly, thanks to the United States Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC), the institute has invested in the latest generation sequencing system which is under a trial operation, expected to quickly detect variants of SARS-CoV-2 in response to the pandemic prevention and control in the central region in particular and nationwide in general.
C.Dan
Translated by N.T
