On behalf of the Government, Minister of Justice Le Thanh Long presented the proposal to add the draft Law on Medical Examination and Treatment (amended) to the Law and Ordinance Building Program in 2022. He said the Government directed the Ministry of Health to study and gather comments from the NA Standing Committee and the complete dossiers to propose the building of the law which will make clearer the viewpoint of “taking the patients as the centre” via measures on improving management over the operation quality of medical establishments and medical workers.

 NA Vice Chairman Nguyen Khac Dinh chairs the working session. (Source: Internet)

Regarding the scope of the law, there is a clear distinction between medical examination and treatment and preventive medicine. Accordingly, the law will only regulate medical examination and treatment. Meanwhile, issues relating to preventive medicine, including improving health (issues relating to nutrition and prevention of mental disorders), prevention and control of infectious diseases, non-communicable disease management and people’s health management will be regulated by the draft Law on Disease Prevention. Besides, the permission to use the Health Insurance Fund to pay for a number of medical examination and treatment services with preventive purposes such as cancer screening will fall within the scope of the Law on Health Insurance.

Reviewing all policies to ensure full institutionalization of Party viewpoints about medical examination and treatment and making clearer the policy of taking patients as the centre, the law amends and completes 10 groups of policies.

 Minister of Justice Le Thanh Long presents the proposal to add the draft Law on Medical Examination and Treatment (amended) to the Law and Ordinance Building Program in 2022. (Source: Internet)

According to Minister Long, the adjustment of the Impact Assessment Report is made towards adding and updating the assessment of impacts on 10 groups of policies, focusing on judging impacts of the regulations on removing the granting of practice licenses for the title of physician; on using language in medical examination and treatment; on decentralizing the system of medical examination and treatment establishments; and on using special nutritious products for children under 72 months old. 

The adjustment of the report reviewing 11 years implementing the 2009 Law on Medical Examination and Treatment is made towards updating, supplementing and analyzing to make clearer the shortcomings in the law implementation during the 2019-2021, particularly issues relating to the COVID-19 pandemic.

The minister said based on the proposal to build the draft law which was adjusted and completed following comments of the NA Standing Committee, the Government proposed the NA Standing Committee to consider and add the draft law on medical examination and treatment (amended) to the Law and Ordinance Building Program in 2022 and to submit to the NA for comments at the third session of the NA (scheduled in May) and for approval at the fourth session of the NA (slated for October).

Proposing the Government to direct to continue supplementing and completing dossiers for medical examination and treatment services

Examining the proposal to add the draft law on medical examination and treatment (amended) to the Law and Ordinance Building Program in 2022, Chairman of the NA Committee on Legal Affairs Hoang Thanh Tung said in order to ensure the quality of the draft law, many members of the committee and other NA agencies suggested the Government to direct to continue supplementing and completing the dossiers such as adding comments of the Ministry of Finance, particularly about regulations on prices of medical examination and treatment services; and assessing more about the socialization of medical examination and treatment services, medical examination and treatment prices, State management over medical examination and treatment and models of family doctors and mobile medical examination and treatment.

Chairman of the NA Committee on Legal Affairs Hoang Thanh Tung presents the examination report (Source: Internet)

Regarding the need to issue the law, Chairman of the NA Committee on Legal Affairs Tung said the committee and other NA agencies agreed with the need to soon amend the Law on Medical Examination and Treatment in order to institutionalize the Resolution of the 13^th National Party Congress and the Resolution No 20-NQ/TW of the sixth Plenary Session of the Party Central Committee on enhancing the protection, care and improvement of people’s health in the new situation; to handle shortcomings in the implementation of the law; add and complete regulations to meet medical examination and treatment demand in special situations like the COVID-19 pandemic; and deal with emerging issues for development, international integration and improvement of medical examination and treatment tasks.

Concerning basic policies of the draft law, Chairman Tung said proposed policies institutionalized Party viewpoints and guidelines relating to renewing and improving the quality of medical examination and treatment in the new situation.

Regarding the time to submit the draft law to the NA, Chairman Tung said most of the NA committees agreed with the Government recommendation to submit the draft law for the NA to discuss at the third session (May 2022) and approve at the fourth session (October 2022) in order to meet urgent requirements.

Agreeing to add the draft law on medical examination and treatment (amended) to the Law and Ordinance Building Program in 2022

Through discussion, most members of the NA Standing Committee agreed to add the draft law on medical examination and treatment (amended) to the Law and Ordinance Building Program in 2022 as well as confirmed the necessity to soon comprehensively amend the Law on Medical Examination and Treatment.

Speaking at the meeting, NA Chairman Vuong Dinh Hue asked to assess more carefully human resources to implement the law. He also said the amendment of the law must ensure transparency and publicity.

He said the amended Law on Medical Examination and Treatment is very important, directly relating to people’s health, urging the compiling agency and examination agency to ensure the highest quality. He agreed to add the draft law to the law and ordinance building program in 2022.

Explaining related issues, Minister of Health Nguyen Thanh Long said the ministry will take comments from the NA Chairman relating to 10 groups of important issues that affect the content of the draft law. On behalf of the compiling agency, the minister said these issues had been discussed and clarified in the proposal and the report on assessing the impacts of the draft law. He said the compiling agency will carefully study the two issues relating to preventive medicine and medical examination and treatment following the principle that preventive medicine will be covered by the State Budget while medical examination and treatment will be spent in line with the Law on Health Insurance. The Ministry of Health is entrusted by the Government to build the draft Law on Health Insurance (amended).

Minister of Health Nguyen Thanh Long explains related issues (source: Internet)

Regarding the price mechanism for private medical examination and treatment services, Minister Long said the compiling board discussed carefully and said if a specific framework is made, it will not create competitiveness, thus not develop the private health sector. However, some point to the need to have specific regulations on the price to ensure the interests of patients. This issue has not yet been completely solved so the minister said the price is currently being implemented following the market mechanism to ensure the quality of private medical establishments.

Concerning the granting of practice licenses or the use of languages at medical establishments for foreigners in Vietnam, the ministry will consult international experience and the opinions of experts, the minister said.

The NA Standing Committee agrees to approve the Resolution to add the draft Law on Medical Examination and Treatment (amended) into the Law and Ordinance Building Program in 2022 (Source: Internet)

At the meeting, with agreement of 100 per cent of members of the NA Standing Committee, the committee approved the Resolution on adding the draft Law on Medical Examination and Treatment (amended) into the Law and Ordinance Building Program in 2022./.