The fatalities are 17 cases higher than in the same period of last year with the majority in the southern region. Among those, HCM City has six deaths, Binh Duong five, and Tay Ninh three. Other localities recording dengue fever deaths are Dong Nai, Dong Thap, Soc Trang, Bac Lieu, Long An and Binh Phuoc.
A dengue fever patient at Bach Mai Hospital in Hanoi
In the first five months of this year, HCM City alone had 11,722 dengue fever cases, up 66.5 percent on-year. Serious cases were 209, up seven-fold on-year.
The Ministry of Health has warned that the number of dengue fever patients would continue to increase in many localities in the coming time.
The National Institute of Hygiene and Epidemiology Pasteur, the Pasteur Nha Trang Institute and the Tay Nguyen Institute of Hygiene and Epidemiology have been asked to set up teams to directly come to dengue fever hotspots for the support.