Health care policy and administration

The parents of a man who died at the Svay Rieng provincial referral hospital of wounds sustained in a motorbike crash say their son might have survived if doctors had not been absent from work celebrating Chinese New Year, and are planning to file a ...

Almost 450 people were rounded up from the capital’s streets last year and sent to the notorious Prey Speu social affairs centre, where in November a man died after being denied medical treatment, according to an annual report from Phnom Penh’s Social Affairs Department. ...

The Kingdom has seen vast improvements in nutrition, general health and mortality rates over the past four years, according to the preliminary results of the fourth Cambodia Demographic and Health Survey (CDHS) released yesterday. ...

Battambang provincial authorities have ordered nine unlicensed doctors to shut down their home-care practices in the province, including six in Sangke district’s Roka commune, where more than 230 residents have tested positive for HIV over the past three months. ...

Pharmacists in Cambodia have a particular affinity for prescribing antibiotics, so much so that resistance to the drugs has become a public health problem worthy of a national response. ...

The ministries of health and interior introduced a joint strategy yesterday to curb illegal medical practices and the use of fraudulent health products. ...

Health Minister Mam Bunheng announced yesterday he has proposed that a reserve budget be used to help victims of the mass HIV outbreak in Battambang province’s Roka village, as he vowed to strengthen health services across the country. Speaking at a press conference following questioning by ...

Over 470,000 units of unauthorised or expired drugs were confiscated during a crackdown on unlicensed medical facilities in Siem Reap City this week, according to provincial police. The inspections of health facilities started on Friday with city economic police working with the provincial health department to ...

Health Minister Mam Bunheng has been summoned for questioning next week by the National Assembly’s health commission over the outbreak of HIV among villagers in Battambang province’s Ro­ka commune, the commission’s secretary-general said Friday. ...

In a small village in Cambodia’s west, a tragic tale of  international significance has caught the local authorities off-guard. An unlicensed doctor has been charged with causing an outbreak of HIV and murder after lax practices resulted in at least 201 people contracting the potentially ...

Plans for a universal health care system will be included in the 10-year strategy to strengthen Cambodia’s social welfare, according to a government official, as a new report reveals almost three-quarters of Cambodians lack any legal health coverage. The study, released this week by the International ...

After facing heavy criticism for the conditions inside its drug-rehabilitation centres, the Ministry of Health has said it will begin offering an alternative community-based approach at health centres nationwide by 2015. According to Chhum Vanarith, a secretary of state in the Health Ministry, the alternative ...

Cambodia’s Labor Ministry on Thursday awarded some of the best performing companies in the country for their work on HIV and AIDS education and prevention at workplaces. Labor Minister Ith Samheng handed over 124 awards to enterprises in a range of sectors, including the garment industry, ...

The risk of Ebola coming into Cambodia remains low despite a recent Ebola scare in Thailand, officials from the Ministry of Health’s Communicable Diseases Control said at a conference yesterday, while still noting that the Kingdom remains vulnerable to other, lesser-known diseases. CDC head Ly ...

Two of the major donors who have supported Cambodia’s highly successful fight against HIV/AIDS are set to make significant cuts to their funding, putting pressure on the government to increase its own spending, officials and experts said. Both the Global Fund, which has contributed more than ...

Abuse of women and children should be considered a public health concern, National Assembly Legislation and Justice Commission chairman Pen Pannha said Sunday. “Discrimination is a serious violation of human rights since it affects the welfare of women, hindering their full participation in social activities. ...

Siem Reap’s Kantha Bopha Children’s Hospital, which has provided free medical treatment since 1998, has been transferred to the Ministry of Health, the Post has learned. ...

As world leaders vowed to dramatically step up the global response to the Ebola virus this week, the Cambodian government sought to reassure investors that they are making adequate preparations to contain an outbreak in the Kingdom. Speaking at an American Chamber of Commerce luncheon yesterday, ...

A study by the International Labor Organization, the U.N.’s labor body, shows most Cambodian garment workers do not eat enough nutritious food and that, as a result, many are anemic and even underweight. Now, a pilot project will feed workers at five factories a free ...

Cambodian authorities are stepping up inspection efforts of vegetable imports along the border after Vietnamese produce shipped to the European Union was found to contain harmful bacteria, an official from the Kingdoms import inspection unit said yesterday. Vietnamese media reported last week said that the European ...

As the deadly Ebola virus continues to plague parts of western Africa, Cambodia has since August put in place detection measures at its international airports and border crossings to screen for several diseases. ...

The United States Agency for International Development (USAID) on Monday unveiled a five-year Integrated Nutrition, Hygiene and Sanitation project in Cambodia, which is estimated to cost 16 million U.S. dollars, according to a press statement from the U.S. Embassy to Cambodia. ...

A draft law regulating the purchase and consumption of alcohol in Cambodia will, if passed, set the country’s legal drinking age at 21 years old, according to officials involved with the legislation, which many see as a tool to fight excessive youth drinking and drunken ...

Researchers in Colombia have conducted a promising randomised trial of a vaccine for the dengue virus, a disease that affects thousands of Cambodians every year, according to results published in the September issue of The Lancet. ...