Hanoi begins second phase of mass COVID-19 testing

People wait for their turn to have COVID-19 testing in Le Dai Hanh ward of Hanoi's Hai Ba Trung district on August 14 (Photo: VNA)

Hanoi (VNA) – Hanoi is collecting 1 million samples for COVID-19screening tests from residents in the areas and 13 groups of people at highrisk from August 18 to 20, the city's Centre for Disease Control (CDC) said.

The high-risk groups includeshippers, sellers at wet markets, employees of supermarkets and trade centres, sellersat home-based grocery stores, petrol sellers, long-haul truck drivers, securityguards, construction workers, sellers at pharmacies, workers at retailwarehouses, persons performing duties at pandemic checkpoints, those supporting anti-pandemicactivities, and environmental workers.

The second phase of massRT-PCR testing aims to identify and isolate infection cases from “red zones”,high-risk areas, and new pandemic hotbeds.

The CDC called on people inthe high-risk groups to contact local health authorities to have samples taken for testing, whichis free of charge.

The first phase, conducted citywide from August 10 to15, collected more than 313,010 samples, discovering 29 infection cases in fivedistricts, including 23 in Dong Da, three in Thanh Tri, and one in Hoang Mai,Ha Dong and Thanh Oai each.

As of August 17 afternoon, the capital city of Hanoi recorded 2,308 locally-transmitted cases of COVID-19 in the fourth wave of infections, which began inlate April./.

VNA