Vietnam Strives to Improve Healthcare with World Bank Support

The management board of a healthcare service support project funded by the World Bank on September 10-11 held a conference in Hanoi to discuss measures to improve management and service at hospitals in Vietnam’s northern region. The project, fully titled North East and Red River Delta Regions Health System Support Project (NORRED) project, has a total budget of $155 million, with $150 million borrowed from the World Bank and $5 million sourced from Vietnam’s reciprocal capital. NORRED aims to provide better health services for 15 million people, especially children and women, alongside with raising the efficiency and equity in the use of hospital services in 13 northern provinces. Participants at the conference touched on ways to strengthen the capacity of provincial and district hospitals to deliver better quality hospital services as an alternative to patients seeking care in central-level hospitals in Hanoi. The bank said that the project, which is implemented from October 2013 until December 2019, also supports coverage of health insurance for households above the poverty line. (Thoi Bao Kinh Te Vietnam – Vietnam Economic Times Sept 11 p2)