Military personnel and task forces in Covid-19 epicenter HCMC have delivered food to the doorsteps of patients and people in difficulty Monday. 

Infantry soldiers of 7th Military Region, which commands armed forces defending southeast Vietnam, and volunteers in Binh Thanh District divide rice, cooking oil, soy sauce, canned meat, milk and vegetables into packages to give 100 families.

Aside from the free food, they also deliver food ordered by locals.

A soldier carries a 50-kilo bag of rice.

Soldiers place packages of vegetables ordered by local people on a truck for delivery in Binh Thanh’s Ward 25. The food was bought by a team from the women union of the ward.

Nguyen Thi Tra My, a member of the union, said it is expected to buy food on behalf of 300-400 families in the ward every day in the next two weeks of stricter Covid-19 restrictions in Ho Chi Minh City.

The union will send a list of food packages, with each costing less than VND300,000, to each residential area for each family to register. The food comes from supermarkets and will be delivered to each household in the morning.

Volunteers from HCMC Communist Youth Union use motorbikes to carry soldiers and food.

HCMC on Monday commenced a 15-day campaign to tighten coronavirus restrictions, requiring people to "stay where they are," isolating homes from homes, streets from streets and wards from wards and have military forces support existing teams in the city in all activities to fight the pandemic, including patrolling and treating patients.

A team of soldiers wears protective suits to deliver free food to a family under Covid-19 quarantine in an alley in Xo Viet Nghe Tinh Street in Ward 25.

The patient, a 35-year-old driver, said both he and his wife have been unemployed due to Covid-19 for several months while raising a child. "Support in this tough time is so precious," he said.

Le Thi Anh, 73, receives a food package she had ordered.

In the past two days, she and her husband could not line up at the supermarkets to store any food due to health conditions. "As we’re both old and with the new order banning people from going out, we would have to rely on help from authorities," she said.

Ten kilometers away, soldiers and volunteers divide free food into similar packages to provide for people in need in Truong Tho Ward of Thu Duc City.

Nguyen Nhat Hoang and his comrades deliver food to poor lottery ticket sellers and workers in Truong Tho Ward.

"Giving them the gifts also lights us up. We will try to do our best to keep people from lacking access to food," Hoang said.

A soldier hands over a food package to a woman in a boarding house area for workers.

Those on the list to receive free food include people that have lost their livelihoods due to the pandemic.The Ministry of National Defense plans to mobilize about 35,000 militiamen and thousands of soldiers from 7th Military Region and 4th Corps, one of the four regular army corps of the People's Army of Vietnam stationed in Binh Duong Province that borders HCMC.

At the same time, more than 2,000 medics and 30 ambulances managed by the military in the north will be sent to HCMC to participate in testing and treating Covid-19 patients.

HCMC has been hit hardest in the ongoing Covid-19 wave that emerged in Vietnam in late April.

The city of 13 million including migrants has recorded around 176,000 community infections and 6,538 fatalities.