Health news update September 11th: Alarm raised over cardiovascular disease in the community.
In 2010, the prevalence of chronic cardiovascular disease among adults in Vietnam was 4%, equivalent to 3.4 million people. By 2020, this number had increased to nearly 8%, equivalent to more than 7 million people, double the figure from a decade earlier.
Alarming increase in cardiovascular disease in the community.
According to experts, the cause of this increase stems from several factors such as a sedentary lifestyle, unhealthy diet, rising obesity rates, high blood pressure, and diabetes.
In addition, the increase in average life expectancy and the growing pressures of modern life also contribute to an increased risk of cardiovascular disease.
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According to Dr. Duong Hong Nien, Head of the Cardiology Department at the 19-8 Hospital, following the general trend, the number of people with cardiovascular diseases seeking examination and treatment at the hospital is increasing.
Every day, the clinic receives 200-300 patients seeking treatment for various ailments, primarily hypertension and acute and chronic coronary syndromes.
Notably, among the cases of myocardial infarction admitted to the emergency room, there were patients in their early 20s. This indicates that cardiovascular diseases are increasingly affecting younger people, especially hypertension and metabolic disorders.
According to experts, thanks to investments in modern equipment such as interventional cardiology machines, arrhythmia ablation devices, pacemakers, etc., the Department has been able to provide timely emergency care for many serious cases, eliminating the need to transfer them to higher-level hospitals. For more than 10 years, the Department has also implemented various interventional cardiology techniques.
Warning about the risk of histamine poisoning from seafood.
Dr. Nguyen Trung Nguyen, Director of the Poison Control Center at Bach Mai Hospital, said that in the past, the unit had received cases of histamine poisoning due to eating frozen seafood that was no longer fresh. Because histamine is heat-stable, it can still cause poisoning even when cooked.
Fresh seafood does not cause histamine poisoning; histamine is only produced in dead seafood. In clean seafood, the histamine content is below 1mg/100g of meat; when the content exceeds 50mg/100g of seafood meat, it can cause poisoning.
When seafood dies, if it is not kept cold enough from the start, bacteria present on the seafood convert the meat into histamine. Over time, the amount of histamine accumulates, leading to poisoning in those who consume it. In fact, many types of seafood such as tuna, mackerel, dried shrimp, and dried prawns, if not properly preserved, can cause histamine poisoning in those who eat them.
According to Dr. Nguyen Trung Nguyen, symptoms of histamine poisoning from seafood appear from a few minutes to 4 hours after consumption, with victims typically experiencing headaches, skin redness, itching, flushing, and general discomfort.
Symptoms typically include redness of the skin concentrated in the upper half of the body (head, chest, and part of the abdomen), swelling of the face or tongue and lips, conjunctival hyperemia, nausea, abdominal pain, diarrhea, and possibly bronchospasm, shortness of breath, palpitations, rapid pulse, and decreased blood pressure. Poisoning usually lasts from 12 to 48 hours. With treatment, the patient will improve within a few hours.
According to the Food Safety Department of the Ministry of Health , since the beginning of 2024, numerous cases of food poisoning have occurred in collective kitchens nationwide, affecting many people and requiring hospitalization. Notably, two recent food poisoning incidents caused by histamine in fish occurred in Nghe An and Hai Phong provinces.
According to the Food Safety Administration, histamine is found in high concentrations in red-fleshed marine fish such as tuna, mackerel, salmon, swordfish, scad, herring, and sardines. When fish spoils, bacteria multiply rapidly, promoting the production of histamine, a toxic substance. Histamine is heat-resistant and is not even destroyed when the fish is cooked.
Symptoms of histamine poisoning usually occur rapidly, within one to several hours after eating. Therefore, the Food Safety Administration recommends that people monitor and detect early signs of allergic reactions after eating seafood within one to several hours.
Healthcare facilities should provide timely counseling to patients to prevent anxiety and panic. If people experience histamine poisoning, they should be quickly taken to a healthcare facility for emergency treatment.
200,000 children have been born thanks to assisted reproductive technologies.
Vietnam has recorded approximately 200,000 births in the past 26 years thanks to assisted reproductive technologies, with an increasing number of infertility treatment hospitals and a rising success rate.
According to Mr. Dinh Anh Tuan, Director of the Department of Maternal and Child Health (Ministry of Health), the field of assisted reproduction, especially in-vitro fertilization (IVF), requires a high level of technical expertise. Vietnam lags behind the world by 15 years in assisted reproduction. In 1998, the first babies in Vietnam were born thanks to in-vitro fertilization at Tu Du Hospital.
From just a few initial facilities, Vietnam has developed approximately 60 assisted reproductive technology (ART) centers nationwide. The success rate of treatment has increased from 10-20% to 40-50%, with some centers achieving 70%. To date, doctors have mastered modern ART techniques used worldwide, including in vitro fertilization (IVM), intrauterine insemination (IUI), and intracytoplasmic sperm injection (ICSI)…
Currently, some facilities are using time-lapse technology integrated with artificial intelligence (AI) to monitor embryo development, ensuring safety and high quality for patients. Some places are applying information technology and biometrics in management to prevent errors, mistakes, fraud, and crime in assisted reproductive technology.
Before the development of information technology, most facilities identified patients using national identity cards or marriage certificates. Now, most places identify customers using chip-embedded citizen identification cards, unique identification numbers, the VNeID application, electronic medical records, iris scans, and fingerprints for identification…
According to Mr. Tuan, a major challenge in the field of assisted reproductive technology is that the cost of infertility treatment in Vietnam is lower than in the rest of the world but still high compared to the income of most people, and is not yet covered by health insurance, making it inaccessible to many couples. For the vast majority of workers, the cost of treatment remains a huge burden, amounting to tens or even hundreds of millions of dong per case.
Experts expect that in the near future, Vietnam will see changes in health insurance policies and coverage, similar to many European and some Asian countries. This will help more couples hoping to have children access treatment, given the declining birth rate in the country.
The World Health Organization (WHO) predicts that infertility and subfertility will be the third most dangerous disease, after cancer and cardiovascular disease, in the 21st century. WHO statistics also indicate that Vietnam is one of the countries in the Asia-Pacific region with the lowest birth rate and highest infertility rate in the world.
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