Vietnamplus

Nearly 40 percent of provincial satellite hospitals have reported a decrease in the number of patients being transferred to higher-level hospitals for treatment, helping to lift the burden on central hospitals that has been weighing them down for decades.

General practitioners will be trained to become family doctors like in many Western countries.

Efforts made by Vietnam to renovate its health care system were highlighted during a speech delivered by Health Minister Nguyen Thi Kim Tien at the opening ceremony of the 68th session of the World Health Assembly in Geneva taking place from May 18-26.

Prime Minister Nguyen Tan Dung has assigned a number of tasks to the Health Ministry to ease hospital overcrowding and improve public health care.

Hanoi has rolled out a number of measures to develop its grassroots health care network in a bid to enhance capacity and service quality, thus reducing overload at central hospitals in the city.

Overloading at hospitals in Vietnam was reduced significantly in 2014, health officials said at an online conference on January 20.

Deputy Prime Minister Vu Duc Dam has requested the health sector intensify its preventive measures against disease epidemics and improve the overall quality of the national healthcare system.

Prime Minister Nguyen Tan Dung on December 6 attended a ceremony to commence construction on the Ho Chi Minh City Children Hospital in Binh Chanh district, which has a total investment of 4.5 trillion VND (roughly 211.5 million USD).

Vietnam and the European Union (EU) signed a financial agreement valued at 114 million EUR for the second phase of the EU Health Sector Policy Support Programme (EU-HSPSP-2) in Vietnam , in Hanoi on December 4.

The measles situation is reported to ease across the country as only 38 new cases were recorded in 25 provinces on April 25 and the vaccination campaign is being accelerated nationwide.

The Ministry of Public Health has proposed buying an extra 1.2 million doses of measles vaccines as the outbreak has so far claimed 133 lives across the nation through both direct infection and complications linked to the disease.