More than 3% of Vietnamese children are disabled, the Ha Noi Moi newspaper cited experts at a recent conference held in the northern province of Phu Tho on May 24. The conference on early detection of deformities among children was jointly held by the Sustainable Health Development Centre (VietHealth) and the provincial Health Department. Experts said birth defects cause disabilities for up to 70.8% of local children aged between five and nine and 74.9% of kids below four years old, adding that lack of health care services in remote and rural areas were the main reason for the situation. Around 10,000 Vietnamese disabled children are provided with orthopedic operations annually, including 5%-7% of cases related to heart diseases. The Ministry of Health is mulling over a plan to use a new diagnosis method of birth defects to halve fatalities among infants.
