Volunteer Vietnamese doctors treat the poor in Cambodia

Communist Vietnam is trying to buy heart and soul of Cambodians by sending doctors to treat poor Cambodians in all provinces. Thanks Vietcong brother, but make sure you really do humanitarian jobs and don't give poisonous drugs to Cambodians. We knew it is not a free gift from Vietcong, exchange for more land or Phnom Penh?

PHNOM PENH — Poor in Cambodia’s Kampong Chhnang, Pursat and Battambang provinces, received free medical check-ups and treatment from volunteer Vietnamese doctors during a two-day visit that ended last Wednesday.

The charity medical drive was made by the HCM City Association for Support of Poor Patients in co-ordination with the Viet Nam Red Cross and the Command of Military Zone No. 7.

A voluntary team of 28 doctors, nurses and technicians from Military Hospital 7A and Nguyen Trai and Tu Du hospitals in HCM City performed free eye surgeries on 692 patients and gave obstetric and gynaecological examinations to 611 women in the three provinces.

All the patients also received medicine and health care gifts worth a total of VND1.35 billion from the Viet Nam Red Cross.

The work was part of the first phase of a charitable medical examination and treatment programme in Cambodian provinces reached by Vietnamese President Nguyen Minh Triet and Cambodian King Norodom Sihamoni during President Triet’s official visit to Cambodia in February.

Cambodian Deputy Prime Minister, Kong Som Ol, said he appreciated the health drive and thanked President Nguyen Minh Triet and the Vietnamese people for their work.

Kong Som Ol, who is also Minister of the Royal Palace of Cambodia, said the aid reflected Viet Nam’s whole-hearted sentiment to Cambodia, affirming the two countries’ traditional solidarity and friendship.

The Deputy Prime Minister said he hoped that impoverished people in all Cambodian provinces would continue receiving medical assistance from Vietnamese physicians under plans to expand the charity programme.

Le Thanh Hai, Permanent Vice Chairman of the HCM City Association for Support of Poor Patients, affirmed that the programme on free eye operations for the poor will be carried out in all Cambodian provinces.

From 2008, he said, the HCM City Association for Support of Poor Patients would conduct free annual reconstructive surgery for Cambodian children with harelips and cleft palates and present 100 wheelchairs to disabled Cambodians.

He said that since 2003, his association had given free eye operations to 7,500 poor patients in 13 Cambodian provinces. — VNS