Private health sector confident in historic legislation

Resolution No.68-NQ/TW is an important historical turning point, creating strong motivation and great expectations from the business community, entrepreneurs, and society. Enterprises expect that the goals and guiding views stated in the resolution will remove barriers, creating more favourable and safer conditions for business, investment, and development.

Nguyen Van De, chairman Vietnam Private Hospital Association

An action plan has been issued to help implement the resolution. In fact, resolutions, directives, and legal documents are constantly being revised and improved to remove institutional bottlenecks, reduce the burden of administrative procedures, unlock resources, and create an open, favourable, safe, and equal investment and business environment.

As a result, the business community and entrepreneurs, including the private healthcare sector, are increasingly confident in production, expansion, technological innovation, job creation, and positive contributions to the overall development of the country.

While having strong expectations and belief, we are still worried about how to thoroughly and effectively implement these resolutions, how to make them truly come to life, creating motivation for private enterprises to strive and develop strongly.

There are some institutional barriers that need to be cleared in a strong and substantial way. The first is stagnation in local governance. Currently, many private projects are stalled not because of delays, lack of responsibility, or determination from local authorities. There are projects that have been approved for investment, granted licences, and put into operation for nearly 10 years, but have been waiting for years due to admin reasons, or because local government agencies cannot agree on land prices and service prices.

The question is: if the current law does not prohibit it, but local officials still do not do it, then whose responsibility is it?

The second issue is inconsistency in land policy for private health investment. The private healthcare sector requires large financial resources and is highly risky, but currently land policies are inconsistent. Some areas apply the socialisation mechanism, while others arrange auctions. Some areas have the same type of private hospital projects, but at some times it is designated, at other times it is auctioned.

The confusion between socialisation policy and market policy in land allocation for healthcare not only causes difficulties for investors, and creates inequality between public and private healthcare, but also affects the budget and the goal of improving the quality of healthcare in localities.

Therefore, I propose that the government issue a decree and separate policies on land mechanisms in private/socialised healthcare investment, ensuring consistency, publicity, and transparency. There should be no distinction between public and private, and especially consistency among provinces and cities.

In order to realise the major policies of the Party and the government, we propose some key solutions to encouraging the private health sector to develop effectively, contributing specifically to Resolution 68 as well as the goals of Resolution No.20/NQ-TW on protecting and improving people’s health.

It is recommended that the government direct the issuance of policies to encourage investment in the health sector which clearly stipulate incentives for credit, land, tax, and access to public services. It should also add a list of priority sectors for high-quality hospital projects and medical facilities in disadvantaged areas. In particular, there should be policies to exempt and reduce corporate income tax, land use tax, and land rent for businesses putting money into this area.

It is proposed that the people’s committees of provinces and cities be responsible for publicly announcing the list of land funds for medical services on their local electronic information portals so that investors can proactively research and propose plans.

After the current restructuring and mergers are completed, there will be many redundant public offices and headquarters. It is recommended that the government provide guidance on reviewing, evaluating, and converting the purpose of using them, building a mechanism for leasing or transferring to the private sector to invest in developing medical, educational, cultural, and environmental facilities to limit waste of public assets.

Resolution effectiveness on private pharma in Vietnam hinges on implementation Within the broader economic vision for Vietnam’s private sector, the pharmaceutical industry, an inherently sensitive and vital realm directly tied to public health and medical security, is undergoing significant transformation to tap into future opportunities.