Medics work in a temporary fever clinic at Traditional Chinese Medicine Hospital of Xiqing District, north China's Tianjin, Dec. 28, 2022. To meet the needs of fever patients seeking medical treatment and relieve the pressure on fever clinics in medical institutions, a temporary fever clinic was recently put into use at the new campus of Traditional Chinese Medicine Hospital of Xiqing District in Tianjin.(Photo: Xinhua)

Hospitals in many cities across China are working overtime during the New Year's Day holidays to battle the infection peak in an overall coordination of national epidemic fight amid adjustments of COVID-19 response.

All employees of the Third Municipal Hospital of Qinhuangdao in North China's Hebei Province cancel their vacations during the New Year's Day holidays in 2023 to fully meet the needs of patients for medical treatment, according to a notice published on the WeChat account of the hospital on Thursday.

More similar notices were issued by hospitals in Chinese provinces at least including Shanxi, Hebei, Hunan, Jiangsu, Shaanxi and Heilongjiang, Chinese news site the paper.cn reported on Sunday.

Local hospitals work overtime during the holidays to ensure the treatment of patients amid epidemic wave as part of the overall coordination of the national and local epidemic prevention and control departments to optimize epidemic prevention policies and ensure scientific treatment.

In East China's Shanghai, multiple districts such as Jiading, Minhang and Songjiang, have improved and perfected their management measures for graded diagnosis and treatment to divert non-urgent COVID patients from top-tier hospitals as infections and critical cases peak in recent days.

In Minhang district, 38,266 visits have been paid to the fever clinics around the district over the past week, among which 26,313 visits were paid to the fever clinics at the community health service centers, accounting for 68.76 percent of the total number in the district, according to a statement shared with the Global Times on Friday.

In order to cope with the peak of the epidemic that is expected to come during the New Year holidays, East China's Zhejiang Province has assigned six tasks to local medical institutions, including improving the service capacity of fever clinics, improving service accessibility, convenience, and continuously improving the ability to treat critically ill patients, according to a local briefing.

As the timing of the peak of the epidemic will vary in different places in China, more precise and scientific prevention and control should be implemented, Liang Wannian, head of the COVID-19 response expert panel under the National Health Commission (NHC), said at a briefing on latest epidemic response on Tuesday.

The treatment of severe cases, ensuring daily medical and health needs should be placed in a more important position, and the prevention and control and treatment capacity building in rural areas should be placed in a more prominent position, Liang said.

Global Times