On October 1, the Ministry of National Defense held a ceremony at Tan Son Nhat International Airport to see off Vietnam’s first Level-two Field Hospital which will be deployed to the UN Peacekeeping Mission in South Sudan.
This has been the first contingent of the Vietnam People’s Army participating in UN peacekeeping operations.
Together with their male peers, 10 female officers have been entrusted and staffed Vietnam’s Level-two Field Hospital. Apart from serving as medical workers at the UN Peacekeeping Mission in South Sudan, these women in uniform will also hold the nation’s missions of promoting the images of the Vietnamese heroic army and Vietnamese women in the eyes of international friends.
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| Vietnam’s Level-two Field Hospital No.1 was established on November 25, 2014 with a 63-strong staff, a step to realize the Party’s and State’s policy on joining UN peacekeeping operations in the field of humanitarian activities. |
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| Under the UN standards, a level-two field hospital is able to examine and offer treatment to a maximum of 40 outpatients a day and 20 inpatients per week. It should also self-equip sufficient medicines, devices and other supplies ready for some emergency scenarios as well as have sufficient forces and means to transport serious patients to a higher level hospital. |
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| The Vietnamese medical contingent will be in charge of running the UN level-II field hospital in Bentiu to take care of over 1,800 military and civilian UN personnel working in the north of South Sudan. |
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| Operating this field hospital located in a foreign land was a real challenge to 63 Vietnamese military medical personnel who had had field experience before. A number of intensive training courses were opened for the medical personnel with the aid of international experts. |
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| Following the signing of a Memorandum of Understanding on Vietnam’s deployment of a field hospital to South Sudan in New York on September 26, UN Under-Secretary-General for Field Support Atul Khare expressed his belief that Vietnam would deploy a high-quality hospital that could contribute positively to the UN’s peacekeeping activities. |
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Together with their male peers, the female officers - the “steel roses” - of Vietnam’s first Level-two Field Hospital have departed for the UN Peacekeeping Mission in South Sudan.
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| This has been the first contingent of the Vietnam People’s Army participating in UN peacekeeping operations. |
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| This has been the first contingent of the Vietnam People’s Army participating in UN peacekeeping operations. |
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| According to Deputy Defense Minister, Senior Lieutenant General Nguyen Chi Vinh, who is Head of the Ministry of National Defense’s Steering Committee for Vietnam’s participation in UN peacekeeping operations, each troop of Vietnam’s Level-two Field Hospital is not only a messenger of peace and culture, but also a representative of the Vietnamese military with its heroic tradition built up from the national resistance wars against foreign invaders and for the sake of national independence and freedom. |
