Yunnan's role as a medical aid provider to the South and Southeast Asian countries has been greatly increased in the past five years, according to data released by local health authority at an annual work meeting on January 12.

On behalf of China, Yunnan Province joined hands with Myanmar, Laos and Viet Nam to jointly control infectious diseases, with 22 border counties of the three neighbouring countries involved in the joint effort, said Li Malin, director of Yunnan Provincial Health and Family Planning Commission at the meeting.

In Myanmar and Laos, Yunnan medical teams conducted a total of 2,299 free cataract surgeries under the ¡§brightness-journey¡¨ program, said Li. Yunnan also sent medical teams in Uganda and provided aid in three batches. 

Li added that another medical team with the Yunnan Fuwai Cardiovascular Hospital recently visited Cambodia, providing diagnostic service to 13,147 pupils in Battambang Province.

Among them, 26 were found carrying the congenital heart disease, and the CHD Cambodian kids will be cured in the Yunnan-based hospital free.

In 2016, the 1st Forum for Hospital Directors of China and South and Southeast Asian Countries was held in Yunnan, and so was the 1st Academic Forum on Traditional Medicine in the Lancang-Mekong River Basin. Both forums were awarded by the United Nations Development Program in the same year.

Li noted that Yunnan will further the above-mentioned medical diplomacy in 2018.

Reporting By Guanxi Ruyi; translating by Wang Shixue