Zhang Yu

JeniZhang13@163.com

THE daily average number of fever clinic visits in Shenzhen’s community health centers has recently fallen back to about 30,000 after a spike during the period between Dec. 11, 2022 and Jan. 1, 2023, which peaked at over 140,000 Dec. 21, the city’s health commission said Thursday.

During the period, 811 community health care institutions in the city had opened fever consulting rooms and received 1.54 million visits, accounting for about 65% of the total number of visits to fever clinics (consulting rooms) in Shenzhen.

The city’s community health care institutions have managed to cope with the surge in fever clinic visits since mid-December last year, a time when the daily average number of visits increased from less than 4,000 to over 140,000.

As per the city’s plan, Shenzhen was projected to open 2,000 standardized fever clinics (consulting rooms) in a short time to meet residents’ needs. There would be 800 at community health centers and 1,200 at public and private hospitals, outpatient departments and clinics.

In mid-December, Shenzhen rapidly expanded the number of fever consulting rooms from 95 to 2,202 in one week. Before the peak of COVID infections came, Shenzhen rapidly divided 1,005 medical service grids  and established a graded diagnosis and treatment system within the grid.

Meanwhile, the city has given priority to ensuring the supply of antipyretics, cold medicines and medications for chronic diseases at community health centers. Some centers also have antiviral drugs such as Azvudine and Paxlovid.

The health commission has also purchased 68,600 pulse oximeters and dispatched them to community health centers. While putting aside a small number of oximeters to meet the centers’ daily needs, the rest were given away to some elderly people for free through family doctors.