Minister of Health: Vaccination for children and women nationwide

SGGPO 05/31/2023 18:40

On the afternoon of May 31, at the National Assembly's socio-economic discussion session, Minister of Health Dao Hong Lan explained and clarified a number of issues raised by National Assembly deputies related to the health sector.

According to the Minister of Health , after the pandemic, the health sector has revealed difficulties and problems that need to be resolved and the health sector is determined to solve them.

Regarding the lack of vaccines in the expanded immunization program in 2023 that the National Assembly deputies are concerned about, the Minister said that over the past years, the Ministry of Health has implemented an expanded immunization program with 10 dangerous infectious diseases for children and women nationwide. In the period of 2016-2020, the Ministry of Health was allocated funds to carry out centralized procurement of vaccines for the expanded immunization program, anti-tuberculosis drugs, anti-HIV drugs, etc.

In the 2021-2022 period, the Ministry of Health is assigned a budget source from the central budget to carry out procurement to supply vaccines for the expanded immunization program, ensuring for the two years 2021 and 2022.

In 2022, the Covid-19 pandemic has affected the implementation of some program contents in many localities. Currently, the Ministry of Health has directed provinces and cities to deploy regular vaccination in the last months of the year, and review the subjects of vaccination, supplementary vaccination, and catch-up vaccination for children and women nationwide.

Minister of Health: Vaccination for children and women nationwide photo 1 — Minister of Health Dao Hong Lan

To implement the content of 2023 with the desire to continue purchasing vaccines of the Expanded Immunization Program, anti-tuberculosis drugs, anti-HIV drugs ARV and vitamin A to serve localities as in previous years, in order to remove difficulties and obstacles for localities, the Ministry of Health has requested the Ministry of Finance to develop the state budget estimate for 2023.

In particular, it is proposed to allocate funds to carry out tasks transferred from the health and population target program to regular tasks to purchase vaccines for the expanded immunization program, anti-tuberculosis drugs for those without health insurance cards, ARV drugs and vitamin A for children. However, according to the provisions of the Law on Public Investment and State budget decentralization, the Ministry of Health is not allowed to allocate funds to carry out this task.

The Minister said that the Ministry of Health has recently reviewed the vaccine sources from 2022 to present. For domestically produced vaccines , the Expanded Immunization Program has provided enough vaccines for 2022 and until July 2023.

In particular, hepatitis B vaccine and tuberculosis vaccine will be used until August 2023, Japanese encephalitis vaccine, measles, rubella, bOPV vaccines will be used until the third and fourth quarters of 2023, tetanus and polio vaccines will be administered at all levels until the end of 2023. Currently, the Expanded Immunization Program continues to deploy the injection of available vaccines at vaccination points of communes and wards.

For tuberculosis drugs, ARVs, and high-dose Vitamin A, the Ministry of Health actively works with donors and uses available drug sources to ensure supply to localities.

Up to now, the Ministry of Health is also implementing a campaign to supplement vitamin A for children nationwide, starting from International Children's Day June 1.

Regarding the imported 5-in-1 vaccine, this is an imported vaccine because in 2022, bidding and procurement procedures will be carried out according to regulations, but there are no contractors participating, so there is a shortage in the market. To ensure vaccines in 2023, the Ministry of Health has submitted to the Government a draft resolution on this content. The Prime Minister has strongly directed the Ministry of Health to coordinate with the Ministry of Finance to arrange funding and the central budget in 2023 for the Ministry of Health to implement procurement according to regulations as in previous years.

The Ministry of Health has compiled the full needs of 63 provinces related to the request to purchase vaccines and directed vaccine suppliers to be ready to supply. On the other hand, the Government and the National Assembly's monitoring delegation have agreed to request the National Assembly to allocate central budget resources to continue implementing the program, in the context that the population health target program has ended.

The Minister also said that, up to now, the shortage of medicine, supplies and medical equipment is still being resolved to remove difficulties. However, in practice, there are still some places that are hesitant and avoid carrying out the procurement process, and localities need to focus on directing.

Regarding rare drugs, the Ministry of Health is developing regulations related to the reserve and assurance of especially rare drugs for nationwide application and is expected to report to the Government in the third quarter of this year.

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