Vietnam Patients to Able to Receive Health Insurance on Holidays

The Vietnamese Ministry of Health (MoH) and the Ministry of Finance (MoF) have jointly issued Circular 16 stating that health insurance services will cover medical treatment during holidays starting September this year. According to the regulation, the health clinics will have to notify Health Insurance services beforehand for the patients to receive such benefits. This is considered to be more convenient since the Joint Circular 41 issued by the MoF required the clinics to notify both Health insurance services and Social Insurance. The decree would take place one day before Vietnam celebrates the Independence Day on September 2nd. The Vietnam Social Insurance Fund now serves nearly 65 million health insurance and 12 million social insurance cardholders, out of Vietnam’s 54-million people workforce. The country targets to raise the percentage of people covered with health insurance from 71.4% to 75% by the end of this year. (infonet.vn July 21)