Specifically, compared to the current regulations in Decree 136/2013/ND-CP, Article 5 of this Decree 20 has added a number of beneficiaries to social benefits and is granted free health insurance cards, including:

1. Elderly people from full 75 to 80 years old belong to poor or near-poor households with the following conditions:

- Not in the case of no person having the obligation and right to serve or having one but this person is receiving monthly social allowance;

- Living in communes and villages in ethnic minority areas and mountainous areas with special difficulties.

Illustrative image (source: internet)

2. Children under 3 years old belonging to poor or near-poor households living in communes and villages in ethnic minority areas and mountainous areas with special difficulties and do not fall into the following cases:

- Children under 16 years old who have no source of nourishment due to abandonment and have not yet been adopted; orphaned both father and mother or both father and mother are declared missing, etc.

- Children infected with HIV/AIDS from poor households.

- People with severe disabilities, people with extremely severe disabilities.

3. People living with HIV/AIDS belong to poor households with no stable monthly income (salaries, wages, pensions, social insurance allowances, monthly social allowances).

Note: If the beneficiaries of social protection are granted free health insurance cards and are eligible for many types of cards, only one health insurance card with the highest benefits will be granted.

Decree 20/2021/ND-CP was issued on March 15, 2021 and takes effect from July 1, 2021./.