During regular health check-ups, if the employee is female, she must undergo obstetric specialty examination according to the obstetric specialty examination list issued by the Ministry of Health.

Deputy Minister Nguyen Van Hoi shared that Vietnam pays great attention to the work of people with disabilities. The 1946 Constitution - the first Constitution of the Democratic Republic of Vietnam - stipulated: "All Vietnamese citizens are equal before the law, and are entitled to participate in the government and national construction according to their talents and virtues."

Inheriting and promoting the 1946 Constitution, the amended Constitutions of 1959, 1980, 1992, and Article 14 of the 2013 Constitution stipulate: "Human rights and citizens' rights in the political, civil, economic, cultural and social fields are recognized, respected, protected and guaranteed in accordance with the Constitution and the law," Article 34 stipulates "Citizens have the right to social security."

In 2014, the Vietnamese National Assembly ratified the United Nations Convention on the Rights of Persons with Disabilities. In 2019, the ratification of ILO Convention 159 on Vocational Rehabilitation and Employment (Disabled Persons) further reaffirmed Vietnam's commitment to ensuring that workers with disabilities are not discriminated against in terms of labour and employment. In 2022, Vietnam joined the Marrakesh Treaty on Facilitating for Persons with Visual Disabilities Access to Writing and Works of the World Intellectual Property Organization.

To realize the Constitution and international commitments, the Government submitted to the National Assembly the Law on Persons with Disabilities in 2010 and the Labour Code, the Law on Medical Examination and Treatment, the Law on Health Insurance, the Law on Education, the Law on Vocational Education,…, which stipulate specific policies to support people with disabilities. In addition, the Prime Minister has established the Vietnam National Committee on Persons with Disabilities to assist the Prime Minister in resolving work-related issues for people with disabilities.

In recent years, besides building a legal system, Vietnam has issued and implemented many programs and policies to protect, care for, and assist people with disabilities in community integration, such as Poverty reduction programs, socio-economic development programs for ethnic minority areas, programs to support people with disabilities, ensuring full and comprehensive implementation of human rights and rights of people with disabilities in all areas, especially ensuring the implementation of political, economic, cultural, and social security rights; ensuring that children with disabilities can go to school, people with disabilities can access vocational training, employment, earn a living, get preferential loans, support housing, health care, access to information, and transportation.

Preferential policies for people with disabilities

According to Deputy Minister Nguyen Van Hoi, in Vietnam, currently, there are over 7 million people with disabilities, accounting for 7.06% of the population aged 2 and over, of which 58% are women; 28.3% are children; Nearly 29% are severely and extremely severely disabled. Vietnam is one of the countries with a relatively high rate of people with disabilities in the Asia-Pacific region and in the world. Vietnam is recognized by the international community as a bright spot in poverty reduction and achieving sustainable development goals, the multidimensional poverty reduction rate has rapidly decreased from 60% in the 1990s to 13.5% in 2014, and by 2023 to about 5%.

The Social Security system is constantly expanding its coverage and improving the quality of policies for people with disabilities. Over 1.6 million people with severe disabilities receive monthly social benefits, 96% of people with disabilities have health insurance cards, central, provincial, and district general hospitals have rehabilitation departments; children with disabilities are supported to study in educational institutions; children who are not able to study in educational institutions are supported to study in specialized educational institutions.

Currently, the workforce of people with disabilities (nearly 4 million people) has been supported to learn vocational training, create jobs, earn a living, or borrow capital at preferential interest rates to create their own jobs. They also receive attention and preferential treatment when participating in traffic, entering entertainment areas, cultural works, and historical relics with exemptions and discounts on tickets. However, in addition to the achievements, Vietnam is still a low-income country, so the work of assisting people with disabilities still has many difficulties in health care, employment, access to construction works, transportation, sports, and culture; people with disabilities still have difficulty competing in the labour market.

The Deputy Minister shared that in the coming time, Vietnam will continue to strengthen international cooperation, and learn the experiences of G7 countries and bilateral, multilateral partners in the region and the world, to achieve the goals of inclusion and integration for people with disabilities; increase assistance in health, education, vocational training, employment, access to public works, transportation, information technology and communications for people with disabilities.

At the conference, the leaders of the Ministry of Labour - Invalids and Social Affairs also expressed that Vietnam wishes to continue to receive cooperation, and technical and financial support from G7 countries in promoting a better life for Vietnamese people with disabilities in the coming time.

Vietnam makes an important contribution in orienting the future direction to ensure the mainstreaming the rights of people with disabilities

On the sidelines of the conference, Deputy Minister Nguyen Van Hoi met and worked with Ms. Sara Minkara, Special Advisor on Disabilities of the US Department of State. At the meeting, Ms. Sara Minkara highly appreciated the mid-term review of the ASEAN Master Plans 2025 on the mainstreaming of the rights of people with disabilities which has been co-chaired by Vietnam and Thailand. The event contributed significantly to the orientation of the ASEAN to ensure the mainstreaming of the rights of people with disabilities.