The Government assigned the health ministry to guide localities in purchasing vaccines, ensuring thrift, efficiency, and safety.
Launched in 1981, the national expanded programme on immunisation is providing vaccines to 12 preventable diseases, including tTuberculosis, measles, and rubella.
According to the World Health Organisation, the programme has saved 42,000 lives and prevented more than 6.7 million childhood diseases in Vietnam.
Dr. Dang Thanh Huyen, deputy head of the programme office under the health ministry, said many new kinds of vaccines will be included in the programme in the coming time.
For example, the vaccine against Rotavirus - the most common cause of diarrhoeal disease among infants and young children - will be provided in a number of localities in 2023, and the whole nation in 2024.
Meanwhile, vaccines against pneumococcal disease, cervical cancer, and seasonal flu, will be supplied from 2025, 2026 and 2030, respectively./.
