(VOVworld) - Nearly 1,900 different services and products at public hospitals will become around 30 percent more expensive in March, according to the Ministry of Health.
 
The new tariff regime will see patients pay for several things that were earlier subsidised by the Government - like power and water, maintenance of equipment and waste treatment facilities, training and research, and more.
Nguyen Nam Lien, head of the ministry's Department of Planning and Finance, said that from July the basic salaries of medical workers would also be borne by patients, meaning tariffs would go up by a further 20 percent.
Last year the department issued a decree to set the new fees for 1,887 health services, including check-up, bed charges, and surgery. The fee adjustment was aimed at ending subsidies to hospitals and gradually improve the quality of health services. Since patients would be paying much more for health services, hospitals would have to improve the quality of treatment.