Hai Dang is a fifth-year student of Pham Ngoc Thach University of Medicine and one of the thousands of young people volunteering to go to the frontline of the COVID-19 battle. With a suitcase of personal items, Dang has been living away from home since May to devote all his time to the virus containment efforts.
Dang’s job is to take samples, classify samples and enter information. To fulfil his task, Dang’s group begins each day at 7h30 am and works until 11 pm or even later. Facing great pressure and high risks of contracting the virus, Dang and his friends always encourage one another so that they can overcome the difficulties they have never before encountered in their lives.
After one week of calling for volunteers to help at virus hotspots, the city has received up to 8,000 applications from students, nearly half of which come from medical colleges.
Deputy Secretary of the Ho Chi Minh City Youth Union Ngo Minh Hai said the volunteers are always ready to support frontline forces in tasks such as the recent vaccination campaign, in which 830,000 doses were given to people in five days, and helping people to make their health declarations and enter information.
Also, at the recently concluded high school graduation examination, volunteers at testing sites guided students, teachers and other staff to their seats and support health workers to take samples.
The difficult days are still ahead and young people in Ho Chi Minh City have come up with effective models to help the disadvantaged overcome the pandemic with confidence.
The zero-dong fridges and minimarts are among such models. With the support of enterprises, such fridges and marts are be installed in lockdown areas to provide disadvantaged and vulnerable people with food and other items free of charge, helping to improve the quality of their meals as the epidemic is expected to continue for a long time.
In many localities, young people are working with the fatherland front and other organisations to support people in isolated areas, such as shopping and cooking for those unable to go out. Such actions have demonstrated the enthusiasm of the city’s young people amid the city’s difficulty.
According to Ngo Minh Hai, the fight against COVID-19 that Ho Chi Minh City is undergoing is also an opportunity for young people to take action in real life, helping them become more mature and capable, as well as raising young people’s awareness of their responsibilities towards the community.
