Day: July 22, 2022

Since the first electric buses were put into operation in Hanoi in December 2021, the number of bus routes using smart electric buses in the city has increased to eight , contributing to enhancing the quality of public in the capital city.

The service, provided by Vinbus Ecology Transport Services Limited Liability Company (VinBus), a member of Vietnam’s largest conglomerate Vingroup, is attracting a large number of users thanks to its high quality and no harm to the environment.

Each bus is equipped with an automated system able to give warnings about unsafe situations, an on-board public address system, free wifi, USB charging ports, and security cameras, among others.

With a battery capacity of 281 kWh, the bus can run between 220 and 260 kilometres on a single charge. It can fully recharge in just two hours at VinBus’s 150 kW charging station network.

Ha Thanh, a resident of Hoang Liet district who often takes buses No. E06, E09 and E01 from Giap Bat to Ocean Park urban area in Gia Lam district, said that she is satisfied with the polite attitude of drivers and staff on the buses.

Operating throughout from 5am to 9 pm daily, VinBus electric buses are part of the city’s public transport system, connecting densely populated areas such as schools, bus stations, urban areas, entertainment areas and transport transaction points.

Thai Ho Phuong, Vice Director of the city Public Transport Management Centre said that with good feedback from users, in the time to come, the centre will work with VinBus to launch more routes, with an aiming to attract more passengers to public transportation services and contribute to reducing air and noise pollution in city streets.

Earlier in December 2019, Vingroup proposed the operation of ten e-bus routes in the city, and committed to investing in 150-200 high-end e-buses./

Source: Vietnam News Agency

The first shipment of the long-acting antibody drug “Evusheld” is expected to arrive in Thailand on July 25 and will be administered immediately to patients with kidney failure and organ transplants.

According to Dr Opas Karnkawinpong, director-general of the Department of Disease Control (DDC), 7,000 of the ordered 257,500 doses will be delivered on July 25.

The DDC director-general said the drug would initially be prescribed to organ-transplant recipients and patients with chronic kidney disease who require dialysis, immunosuppressants. He added that one dose of Evusheld should provide six months of immunity against COVID-19.

Evusheld will also be administered to patients over the age of 12 who are underweight or have not received their COVID vaccinations.

The Ministry of Public Health opted to purchase 257,500 doses of Evusheld from AstraZeneca and reduce its vaccine order with the drugmaker from 60 million to 35.4 million doses. The medication is expected to be distributed to state-run hospitals nationwide.

According to the U.S. Food and Drug Administration (FDA), Evusheld is an intramuscular injection containing two long-acting antibodies. The U.S. agency advises healthcare providers to administer Evusheld only to individuals who are not currently infected with the novel coronavirus or SARS-CoV-2 and have not had a known recent exposure to a carrier of the virus./.

Source: Vietnam News Agency

Low income, high pressure at work and unattractive remuneration policies are listed as the reason nearly 9,400 health workers quit their jobs in State facilities and moved to private health facilities between early 2021 and June 2022.

This was revealed in a report by the Vietnam Health Union which was recently sent to the Vietnam General Confederation of Labour.

The report said according to the current regulations on salary and allowance, a doctor after studying for six years and having 18 months of practice to be granted a practising certificate, will receive nearly 4.9 million VND (209 USD) per month. The amount consists of a salary of nearly 3.5 million VND (149 USD) and an allowance of nearly 1.4 million VND (60 USD). The allowance is equal to 40% of the salary.

The amount of money that the health workers received each month has not deducted a payment of social and health insurance as regulations.

With the salary, it is very difficult to retain health workers working in public health facilities, the report said.

The income of health workers at private health facilities is often triple or quadruple, in some places the income is five or six times more than in public health facilities, the report said.

Since the outbreak of COVID-19, health officials and employees have become the frontline force in disease prevention and control. Working intensity was especially hard when the number of new cases increased, the report said.

“The health workers hardly have days off and they have to work with high intensity for a long time, especially, for health workers in localities with large populations such as HCM City and several southern provinces,” the report said.

Health workers often have to work in a dangerous environment, with high risk of contracting the disease, and in some cases it can be life-threatening. It has profoundly affected the psychology and working motivation of health workers, the report said.

The report also revealed another cause of people leaving was the recent cases of violations of the law in the procurement of drugs, supplies and medical equipment which affected the working environment of health staff.

It also caused a lack of modern equipment to deploy high-technology medical services, lack of medicine, even a lack of common medical tools and protective equipment for health workers.

Therefore, health workers tend to move to private health facilities with better conditions and working environment, the report said.

The report added that the strong development of private hospitals and health clinics with modern and friendly working environment is another reason public health workers are making the switch. Private medical facilities are willing to offer high salaries, while public health facilities do not have a mechanism to keep them.

The union has proposed to raise the level of allowances for public employees working in preventive medicine and grassroots health from 40% to 100% in order to attract more staff.

At the same time, the Party and Government should allow the Ministry of Health to adjust the price of medical services, including the price of medical examinations and treatment services for health insurance participants. It will help increase the revenue of public health facilities so that the public health facilities will have more funds to increase the income for health workers.

Additionally, relevant authorities propose the Government to provide funding to support health workers for their contributions in the fight against the COVID-19 pandemic. Each worker should receive an allowance, equivalent to their monthly salary or double.

It is advised to consider raising the starting salary for newly-graduated doctors to attract young doctors and provide more allowances for senior doctors, the union said.

The Government should have special support policies for health officials and employees working in extremely difficult areas, where natural disasters and epidemics often occur, the union said.

It is necessary to have preferential policies to attract doctors, nurses and technicians working in the fields of tuberculosis, psychiatry and emergency resuscitation./.

Source: Vietnam News Agency

As many as 595 products of Hanoi have met criteria of the One Commune, One Product (OCOP) programme, an economic development programme for rural areas, in 2021.

Addressing a ceremony to announce the recognition on July 22, Chu Phu My, Chief of Hanoi’s Coordinating Office for the New-Style Rural Area Building Programme, spoke highly of the strong efforts made by local departments, sectors, localities and producers to carry out the OCOP programme.

He asked producers to continue improving the quality, design and packaging of the recognised products and enhance connectivity with other stakeholders in value chains to further develop their products.

In 2021, the capital city recognised 595 OCOP products, including 367 rated four stars and 228 rated three stars.

Deputy Chief of the office Ngo Van Ngon said to help producers tackle difficulties caused by the COVID-19 pandemic and resume production and business activities, the office has organised many investment and trade promotion events and assisted them to take part in similar activities in other localities such as an OCOP product forum of the Mekong Delta held in Dong Thap province and the Vietnam fruit and OCOP products festival in Son La province.

From now to the end of 2022, four events will be held in different districts of Hanoi to introduce OCOP products of not only the city but also other provinces in the northern, central, Central Highlands and southern regions.

Authorities will assist with the opening of OCOP showrooms so that these products can access more consumers city-wide. Distributors, shopping centres, supermarkets, grocery and handicraft stores and e-commerce platforms will be encouraged to tighten links with producers to boost sales of OCOP items, according to Ngon.

On this occasion, an exhibition of local OCOP products is taking place at the Royal City residential area until July 24.

So far, Hanoi has recognised 1,649 OCOP products, including four products rated five stars, 1,098 others rated four stars, and 534 rated three stars. It is taking the lead nationwide in terms of the numbers of OPOP products and five-star OCOP products.

Apart from product assessment and rating, the city has also paid attention to organising events, fairs and workshops to increase connectivity under value chains and advertise those products to other localities in Vietnam and international partners. Many showrooms of OCOP products have also been opened in tandem with the development of craft village tourism and rural tourism.

By 2025, Hanoi looks to have an additional 2,000 OCOP products rated at least three stars, all communes that meet advanced criteria of the new-style rural area building programme having OCOP products, and at least 70% of OCOP product makers being cooperatives, cooperative groups and businesses.

The OCOP programme was initiated by the Ministry of Agriculture and Rural Development in 2008, based on Japan’s “One Village, One Product” and Thailand’s “One Tampon, One Product” programmes. It is an economic development programme for rural areas and also to help implement the national target programme on new-style rural area building.

OCOP products are made basing on the combination of local resources, traditional culture, and advanced technology, thus promoting product diversification, quality, packaging, and origin traceability.

The programme has provided farmers with the chance to come together to form cooperatives, which in turn have enabled farmers to create goods with better quality, design, and packaging that meet higher standards and match market demand./.

Source: Vietnam News Agency