Doctors to examine killer skin disease

As many of 300 reports on dermatology and venereology, including 60 reports from Viet Nam, will be presented at the 21st Regional Conference of Dermatology which opened in Da Nang yesterday.

Steven Chow, secretary general of Asian Academy of Dermatology and Venereology (AADV) and the League of ASEAN Dermatological Societies (LADS), said the conference would share information and expertise relating to dermatology practices.

"This RCD has been held the first time by Viet Nam in celebration of the entry of the Vietnamese Society of Dermatology and venereology into the League of ASEAN Dermatological Societies. This important event follows the inauguration of the Asian Academy of Dermatology and Venereology in Ha Noi in 2009," Steven said at the opening ceremony.

"Trainees and dermatologists will take advantage of this special opportunity to attend various teaching courses and workshops at the conference," he said.

Chairman of Viet Nam Society of Dermatology and Venereology, Associate Professor Tran Hau Khang told a press conference the same day that the biennial conference would attract more than 1,000 doctors from 30 countries.

"It's the biggest opportunity for local doctors and experts to share experience, knowledge and studies of scientists and dermatologists from all over the world, as well as plastic surgery and laser therapies on preventing skin ageing," Khang said.

Of the 60 reports to be presented by Vietnamese dermatologists, two reports will focus on a particular skin disease, similar to dermatitis, that affects the palms and soles of the feet. The condition was fatal for 24 people out of a sample of 240 infected with the disease after it first appeared in Ba To District of Quang Ngai Province in 2011, Khang said.

A resident was diagnosed with the condition last month, following no outbreaks of the disease for 11 months.

Local and foreign experts, including those from the World Health Organisation, have yet to find the cause of the disease or devise an effective treatment method, which has been mostly found to have infected residents of Ba To District.

Khang said local doctors have been in discussions with experts from the US, UK, Canada, Japan and Korea on the cause of the disease in the province.

He also said Viet Nam aimed to eliminate leprosy in 63 provinces and cities by 2015, as part of the National Target Programme on leprosy control which began in 1995.

"Leprosy has been controlled in 51 provinces and cities. We'll up efforts to eliminate the disease in the remaining 12 provinces from now to 2015," said Khang, who is also the director of Viet Nam National Hospital of Dermatology and Venereology.

"The country has seen increasingly fungi-related dermatitis and infections, which result from environmental pollution and unhygienic living conditions, as well as sexually transmitted diseases (STD)," he said.

The conference organisers also said the event was incorporated with the 6th Annual Meeting of the AADV, focusing on best practices in clinical and cosmetic dermatology.

The conference wraps up this Saturday.

Acute water shortage for hundreds of households

Hundreds of households in the Hoi Trung resettlement area in Ha Tinh Province have been facing serious shortages of clean water as the water in the area is heavily contaminated.

Nguyen Quoc Le, a resident of Kim Quang Village, has to travel 30km each day to bring back clean water because the source near his home cannot be used for cooking or drinking. Le said the water has been polluted ever since they moved in, in August of last year.

Nguyen Thi Dieu, a resident in Kim Tho Village, said whatever they use to contain water turns black after a few days. "I clean these cups every day but they still look dirty," she said. Her son-in-law has to get clean water from elsewhere when he goes on business trips once a week.

Several households are more lucky, as the water in their area is not contaminated. People from other neighbourhoods come and ask for clean water. However, these households are also worried because the clean water pumps have become unstable.

One local said, "Over the last three months, the pump has been giving out less water than before. I had to spend money in order to bring in water from the stream even though I know it's where buffaloes bathe."

Authorities have tried to use disinfectants but this proved to be ineffective; meanwhile 137 have moved to the Hoi Trung resettlement area giving land to Ngan Tuoi-Cam Trang irrigation project. About 138 wells were dug, yet two thirds of them cannot be used.

According to the chairman of Huong Quang Commune People's Committee, 51 wells are now contaminated and several others have already dried up. Test results showed that iron levels are 26 times higher than what is considered acceptable.

Tran Ngoc Hung, deputy head of the site clearance team for Ngan Tuoi-Cam Trang irrigation project said, "We conducted surveys on the water sources. Our consultants provided four solutions but we chose to drill wells at the people's request."

Hung said that the problem can be solved if the water is left sitting outdoors for two hours, but he did not know the reason for the contamination. "We are seeking permission from the authourities to give financial support for the people to build water tanks. In the future, they will use water from the reservoir."

Student arrested for blackmail through fan pages

A student in Hanoi was arrested for setting up around 100 fan pages that smear the reputations of many agencies and companies, including Dantri/DTiNews, in order to blackmail them.

Nguyen Van Tien, now a fifth year student of the Hanoi University of Technology, is from the northern province of Ha Nam’s Kim Bang District. He opened a fanpage named “Dantri cheats customers”. Right after learning about the page, the newspaper’s editorial board informed the Hanoi Police Department and asked for an investigation. After some effort, the local police detained Tien.

According to the initial investigation, on August 30, 2013, Tien used his Facebook account to create a number of different fan pages using the logos of the agencies and companies in question. He also published his mobile phone number on the pages so that the firms and agencies could contact him to buy the fan page domains at prices ranging from VND100,000 (USD4.76) to VND1 million (USD476).

However, after receiving no offers Tien started to commit libel in order to put pressure on the companies to buy his pages.

Besides Dantri/DTiNews, many other organisations, such as Hoa Phat Group, Vingroup, Oceanbank, Vinacafe and PetroVietnam have become victims to the scheme.

An official from the Hanoi police said the trick of opening a website to stain a company or an agency is not new, however, in this case, Tien set up fanpages without having to register domain names.

“He hoped that some companies would not understand the technical side and would spend the money to get rid of the problem,” the official added.

Old downtown market to relocate next year

A 40-year-old market in the heart of HCMC will relocate next year, instead of this year as earlier planned.

Authorities of District 1 and Ben Nghe Ward where the market is located announced in June last year that some time this year they would relocate the market that occupies a section of Ton That Dam Street in District 1.

However, vendors have proposed giving them more time to prepare, so the authorities have decided to let them have one more year to move.

Vo Quoc Hung, vice chairman of Ben Nghe Ward, told the Daily early this week that a plan to relocate the spontaneously-formed markets throughout the city, including Ton That Dam Street market, had been approved by the city government.

Financial support for vendors at Ton That Dam market cannot be publicized for now, Hung added.

Since the year’s beginning, the district and ward authorities have yet to have meetings with the affected vendors.

According to Trinh Van Them, head of Ton That Dam market management unit, there are currently 212 food stores, cooperatives and stalls at the market.

Most goods sellers at the market said they did not receive a notice about relocation support from the management unit or the relevant authorities.

Ton That Dam market was located on Ham Nghi Street before 1975 and then spontaneously moved to Ton That Dam Street after that year.

Under Decision 17/2009/QD of the HCMC government on market management, in the 2009-2015 period the city will reduce the number of markets in the city downtown. Construction of new markets in other areas would only be approved when market needs are proven.

Ton That Dam market is the first to relocate, which will be then followed by Nguyen Van Trang and Co Giang markets.

Danang City reports consecutive student kidnaps

Local authorities in the central city of Danang have recently warned parents and students about the rising number of cases where students were kidnapped in the city.

Kidnappers often wander around primary schools when schools finish and claimed to be the students’ relatives to pick them up.

On April 1, a student of the fourth grade of a primary school in Thanh Khe District was walking home after school when a man riding on a scooter claimed to be the student’s relative, picked up the student and ran away.

The student, however, tried to resist and was screaming on the way, forcing the kidnapper to drop the student before fleeing.

The school’s principal has confirmed that they received a claim from the student’s family and reported the case to the district office of education and training.

Earlier on March 3, another kidnapping case was recorded in the same district.

While two students of the third grade were waiting for relatives to pick them up, two face-masked young men riding on a motorbike approached them, and claimed to be their relatives and picked them up.

When these students resisted and screamed, these men shut them up by cloth and took them to a deserted alley waiting for another young man. These men robbed the two students of their jewelry and ran away.

The students’ families have reported the case to local police to call for help and police are investigating into the case.

HCM City losing homes to land erosion

There were 16 instances of eroding riverbanks in HCM City's Districts 9, Can Gio, and Thu Duc last year that destroyed six houses, according to the city's Steering Committee for Flood and Storm Prevention and Control and the Committee for Search and Rescue.

More riverbanks in Districts Hoc Mon, Cu Chi, Binh Thanh, Thu Duc, and 2 face a high risk of erosion from flooding caused by high tides and rain. The rainy season normally begins in the first week of May.

Besides, on five occasions high tides exceeded alarm level 3 to rise above 1.5m last year and breach embankments in four spots, affecting more than 570 households.

Accidents at sea like collision of boats and drowning, workplace accidents, and gas leaks killed 15 people and left 31 others missing.

Le Hoang Quan, chairman of the city People's Committee, ordered related agencies and departments to check all embankments and dykes in the city to prevent erosion.

Speaking at a conference to review flood and storm prevention and control and search and rescue yesterday, he urged local chiefs to immediately mobilise all available resources for search and rescue efforts before asking for support from higher agencies.

Last year the city spent VND208.7 billion (US$9.9 million) on building embankments and dams and repairing storm shelters for fishermen.

New school model discussed in Quang Ninh

How to improve efficiency of the new school model for Vietnam (VNEN) in the Red River Delta and northern mountainous and midland provinces was the focus of a workshop held in northern Quang Ninh province on April 11.

At the workshop, participants discussed ways to increase efficiency in implementing the VNEN project as well as shared their experience in teaching and renovating the training method in provinces applied the VNEN.

They said that it is necessary to intensify popularisation, while calling for public involvement in activities at schools, in which the coordination between family, school and society will play a core role.

The participants emphasised the importance of managers and teachers to promote the educational reform in the country, while proposing the Ministry of Education and Training organise more refresher courses for teachers in the coming time.

Speaking at the event, Deputy Minister of Education and Training Nguyen Vinh Hien praised the localities’ efforts and positive results reaped in performing the model.

In order to overcome difficulties in applying the model, provincial education and training departments should take the initiative to apply new teaching and learning methods, Hien stressed.

The VNEN project focuses on reforming teaching method and assessment to student in line with new standards. With the new model, students play a central role in the class while teachers serve as their facilitators and companions, which is different from the traditional pedagogic method.

The model was applied at 1,447 schools across the country in 2012. In the 2013-2014 academic year, the model has been performed at more 600 primary schools in the country.

Viet Nam's multiscreen time tops global average

Viet Nam is above the global average of seven hours of multiscreen time per day, with a majority of users favouring smartphones and laptops as their preferred device, according to a 2014 AdReaction Report.

The report, which surveyed 30 countries, was conducted by Millward Brown, a global communications service group specialising in advertising, marketing communications, media, digital and brand-equity research.

Users in Viet Nam also logged over six per cent more time than the multiscreeners' average screen minutes per day in the Asia-Pacific region.

The figure in Viet Nam reflected the high number of smartphone and laptop minutes, with smartphones taking the leading position for a screen time of 168 minutes a day.

Vietnamese users clocked among the highest number of laptop minutes – an average of 160 minutes a day – compared to other markets in the Asia-Pacific region.

In contrast to other countries, TV remains the least-consumed screen in Viet Nam, taking only one hour of time daily.

Smartphones and laptops dominate the screen the rest of the day, except for early evenings when TV takes centre stage in usage in Viet Nam, the report found.

The report also surveyed consumer receptivity to advertising on TV, smartphones, laptops and tablets, with 12,000 global samples, including 3,000 in Asia-Pacific (with 669 of that number in Viet Nam).

The findings can help advertisers make sense of the multiscreen world for brand-building by taking advantage of the capabilities and effectiveness of each screen.

The report found that most Vietnamese were still highly receptive to TV advertising compared to other formats, although TV no longer represented the largest media opportunity due to limited screen minutes.

Digital receptivity in Viet Nam may trail the global average, but the large amount of time spent on mobile devices reflects a huge opportunity for marketers, the report said.

Int’l seminar on assisted reproductive technologies

Leading doctors, scientists and reproductologists from around the globe will be gathering in HCM City from May 31 to June 1 for an international seminar addressing the latest in assisted reproductive technologies.

The event –Learning Initiative for Fertility Experts (LIFE 2014)–expected to attract at least 150 domestic and international delegates, will include lectures by the world’s leading experts, many of whom are Vietnamese.

Dr. Ho Manh Tuong, General Secretary of the Ho Chi Minh City Reproductive Endocrinology and Infertility Association (HOSREM) said that LIFE 2014 is an important advancement for Vietnam’s assisted reproductive sector, raising the profile of Vietnamese advancements in the field.

Earlier, a delegation of 40 Vietnamese doctors attended the 5th Congress of the Asia Pacific Initiative on Reproduction, ASPIRE 2014, in Brisbane, Australia from April 4-6 and delivered 20 important reports there.

The success rate of in vitro fertilization (IVF) method in Vietnam is much higher than in foreign countries. Vietnam’s achievements in the field have been widely acknowledged by the international community.

Danang hosts regional dermatology conference

The 21st Asian-Australasian Regional Conference of Dermatology (RCD) was held in the central city of Danang on April 10, drawing the participation of nearly 1,000 dermatologists from nations around the world.

At the conference, delegates shared experiences, topics and listened to speakers dilate over the latest scientific studies which are capturing the attention of the international scientific community, including Vietnam.

The latest studies address issues related to an array of hard to diagnose dermatological diseases, which are as difficult to diagnose and treat as many sexually transmitted diseases (syphilis, gonorrhea, HIV/AIDS...).

Dermatology is a highly specialized field and dermatological diseases have major impacts on human health and quality of life. Particularly in Vietnam as many such diseases are aggravated by its tropical climate and give rise a few strange skin disorders, unique to the region.

Vietnamese dermatologists presented 60 out of 300 scientific reports and two reports about the two strangest diseases (hand-foot dermatitis syndrome at Ba To district, Quang Ngai province). Accordingly, leading dermatological experts discussed ways to determine the optimal treatment protocol.

The biennial dermatology conference (first held in Singapore in 1972) aims to exchange and update knowledge on the treatment of intractable skin diseases especially new strange diseases.

Ass. Prof. Dr. Tran Hau Khang, Director of the Central Hospital of Dermatology and Chairman of the Vietnamese Society of Dermatology and Venereology said this is the first time the international conference of large scale and prestige of dermatology has been held in Vietnam.

This offers a good opportunity for Vietnamese professors and doctors to update the latest knowledge and exchange views with their international counterparts about skin diseases such as leprosy, HIV / AIDS ... and some strange disease appeared in Vietnam aiming to make positive contributions to caring for people’s health, fulfilling national target of eradicating leprosy by 2015.

Earlier on April 9, three specialized dermatology classes were held in the framework of the conference, attracting 100 Vietnamese dermatologists and Asian-Australasian dermatological experts.

The conference will run until April 12.

A social foundation has been named after Howart Limbert, who has led a team of the British Cave Research Association to explore caves in the Phong Nha-Ke Bang National Park , the central province of Quang Binh , for the past two decades.

Nguyen Chau A, Director of the Oxalis Travel Company Limited, on April 10 said the Limbert Foundation will grant scholarships for students in Minh Hoa district to encourage them studying and working for Quang Binh’s tourism sector.

It will also invite tourism experts to train local tourism staff and build community-based tourism programmes.

Limbert and his wife will act as advisors having the decisive say in scholarship recipients and community-based tourism programmes, A said.

As the organisation’s founder, Oxalis plans to spend 200 million VND (over 9,500 USD) in 2014 on helping two local households provide homestay services and presenting scholarships to 10 students in Tan Hoa commune, Minh Hoa district.

The foundation will also offer a training course on food safety for residents living by tourism in the park this year.

Covering an area of 85,754ha, the Phong Nha-Ke Bang National Park was recognised as a World Natural Heritage Site on geological and geomorphological criteria by UNESCO in 2003.

Its core zone subject to strict protection is located in Bo Trach and Minh Hoa districts, while the buffer zone covering 20,000ha spreads out over 13 communes in three districts - Bo Trach, Minh Hoa and Quang Ninh.

The property contains and protects over 104 km of caves and underground rivers, making it one of the most outstanding limestone karst ecosystems in the world. The karst formation has evolved since the Palaeozoic period (some 400 million years ago) and as such is the oldest major karst area in Asia .

The park is also home to a large number of faunal and floral species, including threatened species such as tiger, Asiatic black bear, Asian elephant, giant muntjac, Asian wild dog and the recently discovered sao la.-

Quang Binh officials meet overseas Vietnamese

Senior officials of the central province of Quang Binh on April 10 met with over 40 overseas Vietnamese (OVs) from 20 countries and territories who returned home to attend the Hung Kings festival.

Deputy Chairman of the provincial People’s Committee Tran Tien Dung, at the event, recalled the local recovery after the 2013 storms which was partly attributable to the support of OVs at home and abroad.

He expressed his hope that they will offer more help to the locals in the coming time.

On the occasion, the guests also donated 40 million VND (1,900 USD) to the Duc Ninh centre for children with disabilities, plus gifts to the provincial chapter of the Vietnam Association of Victims of Agent Orange/dioxin.

They also offered incense and laid a wreath at the tomb of General Vo Nguyen Giap in Quang Trach district, and later toured several tourist attractions in the locality.-

Proper policies needed to reduce transport costs

Transport costs of cargo and passengers by road always have a huge impact on the price of other commodities and services, in which freight charges account for a large amount of expenditure of the state budget.

According to the Vietnam Business Forum, a weekly magazine of the Vietnam Chamber of Commerce and Industry, Auto transport rates generally are not controlled by the state. Enterprises carry out self-declaration on transport freight rates under the guidance of the Ministry of Finance which makes freight rates often fluctuate, or even not suitable to goods' price, directly affecting the operation of the whole society.

At the conference "Transport Costs in Vietnam" held by the Ministry of Transport recently in Hanoi, a representative from the Directorate for Roads of Vietnam stated that Vietnam now has about 11,000 transport enterprises including 8,000 specialising in freight transportation and 3,000 specialising in passenger transportation. Besides, there are a significant number of individuals and households operating in this field.

Most of the transport firms are running with a small scale, some of them own only one or two cars. It is quite hard for them to establish their brands because of their small scale; therefore, they mainly operate seasonally based on a modest quantity of patrons. Plus, small transportation firms become passive with passengers’ needs which leads to the fact that they cannot be proactive in making up business plan, thus, the efficiency of using means of transportation is not high.

Besides, the small-scale transport brands do not often have business networks or information channels to access to their customers. This restriction leads to low operational efficiency of cargo transportation as not carrying out two-way transportation as well as low operational efficiency of passenger transportation due to low tonnage coefficient.

According to Vietnam Automobile Transportation Association, passenger transport tariffs by cars along fixed routes, under the signed contract and tourists transport in Vietnam are 20 percent higher than that in Laos, Cambodia, Thailand, but lower than that in China.

Major freight companies in Hai Phong and Ho Chi Minh City also pointed out that now they perform freight shipping contracts under the agreements with goods’ owners in a particular time with flexible prices. In fact, current freight rates in Vietnam in recent times are unstable and higher in comparison with Vietnamese people’s livelihood and freight rates have an upward trend.

Deputy Minister of Transport Le Dinh Tho said that until now, there are no official statistics on the value of transportation in Vietnam’s annual gross domestic product (GDP). Currently, reliable scientific research data on Vietnam’s transport expenses is still uncommon and rarely published or used in the process of establishing mechanisms, policies or plans.

It is necessary to reduce transportation costs with the aim of decreasing prices of other products and services and ensuring social security.

According to the Vietnam Automobile Transport Association, to decline road transport costs, Vietnam needs to implement proper policies in regulating import tariffs towards road transport business. Price of cars, which suits areas, will have a positive impact on transport costs. Simultaneously, Vietnam needs to provide stricter business conditions to reorganise transportation firms; transport units with appropriate scales will reorganise their production in accordance with their conditions in order to reduce input costs.

The Directorate for Roads of Vietnam said Vietnam can build a “Freight Transport Trading Floor” as a tool to exchange information between transport companies and shippers in order to create market transparency, repair one-way transportation, increase transport operational efficiency, reduce transport expenses and reduce the number of trucks on the roads.

Besides, it is possible to build a large-scale truck station system, goods’ wholesale and distribution in big cities or centres of goods production and consumption to collect small quantities of goods which need long-distance transportation into an enormous quantity to transport by heavy trucks. When the wholesale system is put into operation, it will help to minimise the transportation of long-distance goods by small trucks, decrease costs per unit of transporting outputs and reduce traffic density on highways.

In particular, representative of Directorate for Roads of Vietnam recommended that Vietnam should invest in upgrading road infrastructure to shorten road length and increase transportation velocity, thus, enhance capacity of cargo and passenger transport.

Electricity causes most blazes: City fire chief

All commercial and domestic users should exercise greater caution with electricity, which is responsible for most of fires in HCM City, the city fire chief has said.

Speaking to the media on Thursday, Lieutenant Tran Trieu Duong said: "Companies, organisations, and households should be equipped with safety equipment like gas leak warning systems and extinguishers to put out fires as soon as they break out."

In the first quarter of this year, there were 94 fires in the city, 47 per cent fewer than in the same period last year, in which three people were killed and three others were injured.

There were also two explosions in which four people died.

The department received 360 fire calls, half down from a year earlier, with 222 of them caused by burning grass and waste.

From companies and organisations, it collected fines of VND1.6 billion (US$780,000) after checking for fire safety equipment.

"We are always focused on education," Duong said.

"In this quarter over 50,000 people have taken part in 3,500 hours of training in fire safety."

The city plans to upgrade its firefighting ability to match the rest of the region, he added.

VNA/VOV/VNN/Dantri/VNS