Speeches Shim
On October 28-29, the USAID Linkages for Small and Medium Enterprises (USAID LinkSME) project and the Vietnam Association for Supporting Industries (VASI), a leading business support organization in Vietnam, supported VASI's SMEs to participate in the Factory Network Business Expo 2020. The event served as a platform to strengthen business linkages between SMEs and lead firms. Nearly 200 Vietnamese manufacturers and international buyers, including Japanese, Korean, and Thai companies, seeking to purchase from local Vietnamese SME manufacturers participated in the event in-person and remotely via online platforms. USAID LinkSME and VASI supported 20 SMEs to display their products at the pavilion for Vietnamese Enterprises in Supporting Industries.
On November 14-15, USAID’s Improving Access, Curriculum and Teaching in Medical Education and Emerging Diseases (IMPACT-MED) Alliance, Vietnam’s Ministry of Health, and the Thai Nguyen University of Medicine and Pharmacy organized an annual Medical Education Conference in Thai Nguyen City. This conference provides an annual forum for sharing innovations and advances in medical education in Vietnam and the Southeast Asian Region. The two-day event attracted more than 700 professionals, in-person and virtually, including leaders in medical education, students, and faculty in Vietnam and around the world.
Over the last five years, USAID has worked closely with Vietnam Social Security (VSS) to include coverage of HIV treatment services and antiretroviral (ARV) drugs in the SHI scheme. As a result, over 90 percent of persons living with HIV nationwide are now enrolled and use SHI-covered HIV services. This year, SHI is set to procure ARVs for more than two-thirds of all HIV patients nationwide. On November 6, USAID/Vietnam Mission Director Ann Marie Yastishock and VSS Deputy General Director Dr. Phạm Lương Sơn signed a Memorandum of Understanding (MOU), formalizing that the USAID Local System Sustainability project will provide technical assistance to VSS to improve its SHI implementation for the next four years.
One of the challenges in Vietnam’s efforts to combat wildlife trafficking is weak coordination among relevant enforcement agencies at the provincial level. To help address this, in 2019, the USAID Saving Species project supported Lao Cai province (which borders China and is on a commonly used route for illegal wildlife trafficking) to develop and launch a provincial interagency protocol for coordination of wildlife law enforcement agencies. On October 27, USAID Saving Species organized a one-year review of its implementation, which was attended by 68 representatives from Lao Cai Department of Agriculture and Rural Development, USAID, Vietnam CITES Management Authority, and related provincial enforcement agencies. Since the protocol’s approval in June 2019, out of the 140 cases detected by various legal enforcement agencies in Lao Cai, they collaborated on 12 wildlife crime cases, which led to the rescue of 48 wildlife animals and their release back into the forest or transfer to a wildlife rescue center in Lao Cai’s Hoang Lien National Park.
Children and adults with Autism, Aphasia, Down Syndrome, or other conditions often have severe speech or language problems and may need to use augmentative and alternative communication to supplement or replace speech or writing. USAID’s Advancing Medical Care and Rehabilitation Education project, implemented by Humanity and Inclusion (HI), supports the skills development of Vietnamese speech and language therapists, including providing training and equipment to partner hospitals in Vietnam. Over the past year, USAID and HI worked with Danang University to develop a Vietnamese version of TalkTablet, a symbols-based speech solution for people who are unable to clearly communicate as a result of Autism, Aphasia, Down Syndrome, Stroke or other conditions. TalkTablet is a well-recognized communication mobile app, developed by Gus Communication Devices Inc. - a leading American developer of speech software and apps for over 25 years. On November 10, USAID and HI launched the Vietnamese version of the app in Hue City and made 500 free accounts available to hospitals and patients.
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