Tieng Viet lovers club

[jackbl]

If i not wrong, she reply "爱你的头"

Originally Posted by utd4ever59

I told my girlfriend Änh yeu em"' and her reply was "Yeu cai dau may '"

[jackbl]

Some college graduates opt for low-pay, low-stress jobs
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VietNamNet Bridge – Not every new college graduate is a money-hungry workaholic. A student newspaper, Sinh Vien Vietnam, reports that many in the Class of ’09 are saying ‘no’ to high-pay, high-pressure jobs because they want to have time to pursue their passions.

Seeking low pay jobs

Dat is a well known photographer in Hanoi. For several years, he was an art designer for a telecom company, earning $1,000 a month, high pay for a young man. His prospects for promotion were good, but he suddenly quit. Work responsiblities were interfering with his real love, phuột (motorcycle trekking).


Thuy Minh, only just graduated from the Hanoi University of Foreign Trade, was offered jobs in the offices of big economic groups with starting pay of $400 per month. However, she was indifferent to the invitations. To many people’s surprise, Minh decided to work for Samsung and accepted a lower salary.


“I like traveling. If I worked for that companies, I would not have time for my hobby. Meanwhile, I feel happy with my current job which gives me time to travel whenever I want,” Minh said. “Instead of working on weekend like my friends, I can travel on Saturdays and Sundays.”

Thuy Huong, just graduated from the Chinese Language Faculty at Hanoi University, thinks that people need to ‘live slowly and enjoy life’. Though Huong has been invited to work for many Chinese and Taiwanese companies based on her good record in part-time jobs when she was a student, Huong has refused all offers.



“When I was a student, I wished I could go to belly dance classes and learn to cook,” she said. “However, I was so busy that I did not have time for these things. Now is the right time for me to do what I like.”



‘Decoding’ this strange tendency

SVVN comments that the present crop of students has a novel viewpoint. Unlike their predecessors, many students believe that they not only need to ‘accumulate work experience’ but also they should gain ‘living experience’ as well.

Tien Thanh’s a new graduate of the Trade University. He related that he is working for a state-owned company for a modest salary. However, in return, he can be absolutely ‘free’ on weekends. Thanh spends his spare time traveling to a lot of destinations in the country to ‘accumulate real-life experience’.



It’s not foolish to take a relatively low paying job at a state owned company, Thanh argues. He said that his way prepares him for a better life in the future. Besides traveling, Thanh is seeking a scholarship that will permit him to go abroad to earn a masters degree.



It seems that Vietnamese youths have begun to adopt a Western lifestyle, comments SVVN, offering this explanation: Westerners imagine that time is an arrow and no one can go back to the previous time. Therefore, its important to do the things they like whenever they can. Meanwhile, Vietnamese think that time moves in a circle, and so have a tendency to delay doing things.



Louis, a young Brit, told the student newspaper that many of his Vietnamese friends who teach at an international school are following the western lifestyle.



“They refuse to work on weekends, even though the pay is double, in order to have time for private hobbies,” he said.



In the US, many students now elect to take a ‘gap year.’ After finishing high school, they do not go straight to universities, but go to take jobs, participate in activities or travel before they return to classes one or two years later. In Vietnam, however, it seems that all Vietnamese students know only one way: go to high school, then go to university, then take jobs and earn money.



It seems that girls are more likely to break out of this mold than boys. According to Thu Quynh, who has just gotten her degree at the Institute for International Relations, girls fear that they will not have time for private hobbies after they marry. Therefore, they try to do what they want to do right now, while they still have time.



VietNamNet/SVVN

[Thom07]

Originally Posted by tomcat007

Bro

Please help to translate the bold portion of the following message:

e xin loi tai luc nay may e het pin. e rat thich a. a rat la de thuong. e ve viet nam a o lai giu gin suc khoe nha. e ve viet nam sms cho a chuc a vui va hanh phuc.

The non-red portion I understand, but just included here to give the full picture.

Thanks.!

Let me try.

a rat la de thuong - some sweet stuffs like you are a person she dote on or like in a gentle way.

a o lai giu gin suc khoe nha - take care of yourself or your health here.

[tomcat007]

Originally Posted by utd4ever59

I told my girlfriend Änh yeu em"' and her reply was "Yeu cai dau may '" Can anyone help to translate for me. Many thanks.

Bro,

I was with my girl just now and I show her your girl's reply.

The first instance she read it, she slap me on the head. Then, after clarifying that it does not belongs to me, she says...

"Not good. Something like fuck you."

Well, my girl is from Hanoi (yours may be from HCM) but I would think the difference in meaning won't be great.

[tomcat007]

Originally Posted by Thom07

Let me try.

a rat la de thuong - some sweet stuffs like you are a person she dote on or like in a gentle way.

a o lai giu gin suc khoe nha - take care of yourself or your health here.

Cam on nhieu lam.

[jackbl]

Child labor in VN ..... how fortunate are sgp children

HCM City: Children working 80 hour weeks “paid” once a year
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VietNamNet Bridge – An official from the HCM City Department of Social, War Invalids and Social Affairs admitted to Tuoi Tre newspaper that child labor is a problem in some districts in HCM City, particularly Tan Phu, where many children must work 10-14 hours per day.

On October 30, a Tuoi Tre reporter visited a private garment enterprise at 173/20 Thoai Ngoc Hau Street, Phu Thanh Ward, Tan Phu District, accompanied by Phu Thanh ward officials and police officers.



In a small room of several dozens of square meters, nearly ten workers were busy working.



Sitting among piles of cloth was a half-naked boy.



Meet Le Van Nhut, 15, from Quang Ngai.



Nhat said that he works daily from 7.30am to 11.30am and then from 1pm to 5.30pm and from 7pm to 11pm. He had no weekend or day off.



Tuoi Tre asked Nhat about his work contract and he replied “What is a work contract?”



He did not know how much his salary is because his employer promised to pay Nhat at the year’s end.



Same same, but illegal



Tuoi Tre reporters and Phu Thanh officials visited other enterprises, where most of workers told the same stories. They have to work over 80 hours a week, with no weekends and no extra pay.



While their employers sat next to them, some workers said that they do have labor contracts.



When asked about the details of their contracts, such as health and social insurance, they all said they didn’t understand what these things were.



These “workers” are children from many places, mainly Quang Ngai and Thai Binh as well as some southwestern provinces.



At a room of house No. 553/21 in Luy Ban Bich Street, over 20 workers were laboring in a narrow space, surrounded by piles of cloth and material. Tuoi Tre reporters spoke with two of the many child workers.



One is Pham Nhat Cuong, 14, from Quang Ngai. He said he had worked there for three months and knew nothing about his salary. He said he would be paid at the end of the year.



Another worker is Dang Thi Thuy Duong, 15, from Soc Trang Province, who also didn’t know about her salary.



How to stop child labor abuses?



The latest survey of the HCM City Labour Inspector shows that, of 173 inspected firms, 62 employed child workers, with 149 less than 16 years old.



The numbers of child workers is high in the districts of Tan Binh and Binh Tan. Children must work in poor conditions for 10-14 hours per day without labor contracts.

Except for one limited liability company, these businesses are not registered. An official from the Tan Phu District’s Labour, War Invalids and Social Affairs Department admitted that there are thousands of such enterprises in HCM City.



The Tan Phu District’s Labour, War Invalids and Social Affairs Department Chief Phan Anh Nhan observed that in the January-September 2009 period, the department discovered 23 violations of the Labor Code, including four cases of child labor. Nhan noted that child labor is a common problem of HCM City, not only in Tan Phu district.



He said there are many difficulties in dealing with this problem, including the lack of personnel and the change of workshops to private firms that use child labor.

Originally Posted by jackbl

Newspaper exposé focuses attention on people behind child beggar bands
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[jackbl]

Sweatshop found overworking underage kids
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VietNamNet Bridge - A garment factory in Ho Chi Minh City has been found forcing its illegal under-age laborers to work 17-hour days after a 16-year-old employee was hospitalized last week.

Nguyen Van Den from Hue was rushed to Trung Vuong Hospital last Wednesday when his abdomen and other parts of his body began to swell and he had difficulty breathing, a doctor at the hospital told Tuoi Tre Thursday.

Den visited a medical center in Ho Chi Minh City’s Tan Phu District last Tuesday but his employer sent him back to the factory that same night instead of allowing him to stay at the center for treatment. His condition worsened on Wednesday and he was taken to Trung Vuong, where he was put on a respirator and diagnosed with pneumonia.

According to the doctors, he had suffered a shortage of vitamin B1 due to excessive work.

His mother, Dao Thi No, who came to take care of him at the hospital, called Tuoi Tre on Thursday evening via phone at the Saigon Railway Station, saying that she was taking Den home as they had no money and the employer had refused to pay Den his wages for nine months’ work.

Abuse

The legal working age is 18 in Vietnam, but Den said he had been working 14-16 hours a day for Nguyen Thi Chau A at a sewing factory on Luy Ban Bich Street, Tan Phu District, where he had half an hour for each meal and was banned from contacting his family.

“The factory recently received large orders for Tet (The Lunar New Year), so I had to stay up until one or two in the morning,” Den said. “I always had a headache and felt dizzy.”

Den said he had felt sick and visited a medical center in August.

“When I returned to the factory and lay down, A kicked me in the head and said I was pretending.”

No said she was sorry her son had gone to Ho Chi Minh City in the first place. “I sent my child so far away to work and I didn’t know that he was mistreated, I just knew that he worked long hours.”

No said he had asked A several times to let her son visit but A told her to come to Ho Chi Minh City instead.

“I don’t know anything about the city and I don’t have money to do that.”

The mother and her son said they had relied on some loose change given to them by other patients at the hospital to buy food.

Denial

A said she had not signed labor contract with Den and had only promised his mother that she would pay Den VND5 million (US$279) a year and a bonus of VND1 million if he works well.

She denied beating Den, saying she had only pulled his ears.

A is employing six workers 16-23 years of age, some having been working there since age 14.

Her husband Duong Van Chuong said all garment factories in the area were employing underage workers and forcing them to work overtime. “That’s normal because we sell very cheap.”

Officials from the city Department of Labor, Invalids and Social Affairs have checked the factory and proposed that the city government punish A.

VietNamNet/Tuoi Tre/Thanh Nien

Originally Posted by jackbl

Child labor in VN ..... how fortunate are sgp children

HCM City: Children working 80 hour weeks “paid” once a year
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[jackbl]

HCM City: Child labour tales from clothing industry
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VietNamNet Bridge – Many Vietnamese children are spending their childhoods working around the clock for clothing manufacturers.

At a clothing business in HCM City, most child workers have to work 14 hours per day in small, hot, gloomy rooms. Employers openly admit they don’t have work contracts and have to work the whole week.



They explain away their use of child workers by various means, saying it is difficult to hire adult workers or more honestly that they employ children to cut labour costs.

Hoang Van Hanh, who runs a clothing business in Ward 13, Tan Binh district, HCM City, which uses many child workers, said: “We have run this business for eight years. We only earn enough to live on so we don’t have a business licence. Nobody comes here for labour inspections and nobody tells me about how many working hours are set for workers at what age. We work until 12pm here, no problem.”

The owner of an sewing enterprise in Phu Thanh ward, Tan Phu district, said: “It is the same everywhere, all clothing enterprises in the city use child workers who work until 12pm”.

Dang Thi Hai Ly, who runs a garment enterprise in Binh Hung Hoa Ward, Binh Tan district, said: “It is normal for them (children) to work until 12pm. When I was a child, I also worked like this”.

She knew little regarding laws on labour, business registration, labour registration or labour contract.

It is rare to have a few employers who voluntarily cut down the working schedule for child workers. “I ask them to work till nearly 11pm, instead of 1-2am like neighbouring enterprises. I know that I have breached the labour law but I can’t do it any differently,” said Vo Van Chuong, the manager of a private clothing workshop in Binh Hung Hoa Ward.



Sourced from poverty

Many children from the central province of Thua Thien – Hue have to go to HCM City to work like Nguyen Van Den. In Diem Truong village, Den’s hometown, a father named Pham Van Anh said that he has six children and his eldest daughter, 13, recently went to Saigon to work. He said the little girl is working for her aunt and earns 5 million dong ($290) a year.

Anh’s father, Pham Thu, said his nephew was maltreated. This 14-year-old boy started working for a clothing enterprise in HCM City early this year. The employer said the annual pay is 10 million dong ($590).

“Three months ago, he called home and said that he had to work until between one and two am. He couldn’t stand it and wanted to go home but the employer didn’t agree, saying that my nephew had to return the fare from here to HCM City, food expenditures and vocational training fees for the last few months. My nephew’s sister in HCM City had to ask for the police’s assistance. He is now working at the same garment enterprise as his sister,” he told Tuoi Tre newspaper.

Huynh Dien, the chief of Trung Hung village, Vinh Hung commune, Thua Thien – Hue province, said: “Over 100 families in my village have children working in Saigon. Only 30 families here earn enough to eat. They are too poor and have many children so they let their children work in Saigon”.

Everywhere, people said they are too poor and there is no job to do in the countryside so the kids have to go to HCM City to work.

Vo Thi Kim Khanh from the Thua Thien – Hue provincial Department of Labour, War Invalids and Social Affairs, said there are three reasons for rural children to quit school early to work in cities: their families are too poor and have many children, they follow their friends and they are enticed by labour agencies who come to rural areas to recruit child labour.

VietNamNet/Tuoi Tre

Originally Posted by jackbl

Child labor in VN ..... how fortunate are sgp children

HCM City: Children working 80 hour weeks “paid” once a year
================================================== =======

Originally Posted by jackbl

Sweatshop found overworking underage kids
================================================== ==

[jackbl]

School holiday is on.... if u bring the children to hcmc and look at how these children work, i think they will appreciate life and their parents more in sgp...



HCM City’s exploited children – Is there a remedy?
=================================================
Following up its shocking reportage on child labor and child beggars in HCM City, Tuoi Tre gathered a group of lawyers, child experts and local officials to search for answers to widespread exploitation of underage laborers in the southern metropolis.


Lawyer Nguyen Van Hau opened the discussion. “According to HCM City Bar surveys,” he said, “the demand for child workers in HCM City is on the rise, particularly as peddlers or shop workers, or in garment and brick making. Children are not just abused as workers, but are also subject to sexual abuse.”

“It is not true that the problem is a shortage of laws. Vietnam’s legal system regarding this matter is quite sufficient,” the lawyer said. He said the main factors putting children at risk are hunger, poverty and limited access to education and vocational training.



Irresponsibility

Doctor of Education Nguyen Thi Bich Hong (HCM City Teachers Training University), agreed with Lawyer Hau. In her recent fieldtrip to the central region, many families told her they were happy to have their children working in HCM City.

Almost all participants agreed that the family situation plays a critical role. The child beggars and workers typically come from poor, rural households with many children. Parents who encourage their children to quit school and work in HCM City don’t understand that they have brought their children to a miserable life. The parents “give many reasons to vindicate their actions, but all of them are unsatisfactory,” said Lawyer Nguyen Bao Tram.

Tan Phu district has many enterprises that rely on child labor. Phan Minh Thang, a ward vice-chairman, acknowledged that local authorities must take much of the blame. “We have not been in very close touch with this problem. We told ourselves that the childrens’ work was light, so we ignored it,” Thang said.



What’s the solution?

According to lawyer Hau, it is necessary to strictly punish people who employ children in illegal ways. He suggested the authorities have a hot line for this matter.

Lawyer Bao Tram also said that a happy relationship between the employers and child workers is impossible. Employers who violate the laws must be punished. Children must have the right go to school, to play and to be cared for. There is lots of talk about punishing delinquent parents and employers, Tram said, she has never yet seen a child abuse case taken to trial.

“In my opinion, enterprises that abuse child workers must be fined seriously and their names must be made public,” Tram emphasized. “We need to build up a social movement aimed at preventing anyone from continuing to exploit children. The law must punish parents who force their children to work. There ought to be bigger fines on individuals and companies that break the law.”

Thang, the ward official, said some child abuse cases must be brought to court to deter others. “Yes,” answered Le Xuan Lang, a senior official of the city’s Labor, War Invalids and Social Affairs Department. “However, it is not so easy.” She cited examples: When labour inspectors find children working at a private enterprise and propose to them back home, kids say that if they are taken home, they would return to HCM City very soon because “here we have rice to eat. At home, there is only sweet potatoes and cassava.”

“When we hear this, we have to pull pack in punishing labour law violators,” Lang said. She explained that any enterprises found to be using children of less than 15 must stop immediately. Child workers aged 15 to 18 must be protected under the Labour Code and work lighter hours than adults.

If HCM City is resolute in its effort to wipe out the child beggar rings, argued Dr. Bich Hong and Lawyer Tram, it can succeed. First of all, people need to realize the only ones who benefit are those who exploit the children. There ought to be a program that mobilizes the people to report incidents, and every ward should have a hotline. Then, whenever child beggars appear on any street, the authorities should be informed and react immediately

Doctor of Psychology Nguyen Thi Bich Hong said that many parents unintentionally violate their childrens’ rights when they send them to HCM City to work. The law must be explained to them, and also the terrible consequences for the children. People who exploit child labor ought to be severely punished, of course, but it’s also essential to teach them what the law requires and give them an opportunity to change their behavior.

Lawyer Nguyen Thi Hong Lien said the HCM City Peoples’ Committee has clearly specified which agencies that are responsible for dealing with child abuse but these agencies have not really paid attention to this problem -- thus child abuse is still a problem in the city.

“The law is very clear but if it is not implemented, this matter will exist forever,” Lien said.

Originally Posted by jackbl

HCM City: Child labour tales from clothing industry
================================================== ======

[jackbl]

Corruption is everywhere in VN!!!

Health sector afflicted by corruption malaise
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Bribes and gifts have become so commonplace that they are not seen as corruption by many patients.


Nguyen Thi Quy Hien paid the hospital cleaner VND20,000 (US$1.08) each time she cleaned the room where her four-year-old daughter was being treated.

“I had to do so to make the cleaner feel happy enough to clean the room for my daughter. Otherwise she would just do it in a very careless manner,” the 30-year-old mother told Thanh Nien Weekly.

Hospital cleaners on average earn monthly salaries of VND1.4 million to 1.6 million ($79-90)

Hien, a teacher in District 7, had her daughter admitted several months ago with high fever at the Children’s Hospital No.2 in District 1. The daughter was discharged after three days.

There were no regulations for extra-payment for the hospital cleaners, but everyone appeared to adhere to the unwritten rules, Hien said.

“For the nurses, I did not give money but bought them some fruits as a token of gratitude,” Hien said.

For another patient in Hanoi, informal payment was a must to fast-track her treatment.

The breast cancer patient at the K Hospital in Hanoi said she was told by another patient sitting next to her in the hospital that in order to expedite the operation, the latter had to pay the doctor in charge VND2 million ($108) in advance, according to an article published on August 7 by Tuoi Tre newspaper.

“She told me that the money was not hidden in the envelope but put right on the desk in front of the doctor,” the patient said, declining to be named.

“One day later, she was able to have the operation,” she said. “For my husband, who had also finished an operation at another major hospital [in Hanoi], I was advised to buy ‘thank-you’ gifts for the doctor in charge and his assistants.”

According to a study on medical ethics released in August by the Hanoi Medical University, over 70 percent of medical staff members interviewed admitted they sometimes or often breached medical ethics. The most common wrongdoing was asking for bribes and gifts from patients.

A study by the Union of Science and Technology of Vietnam done on 140 patients during 2009 shows 25 percent chose medical establishments based on whether they know someone from that establishment. It also found that the cost of presents made to medical personnel amounted to nine percent of the total cost of each treatment cycle.

Offering bribes or presents to doctors is a practice that has been plaguing the Vietnamese health system over the past years. It has become so common and routine that people do not even recognize it as a corrupt practice that could undermine the health sector.

Corruption in the health sector is a particular concern in developing and transitional economies like Vietnam where public resources are already scarce, speakers said at the Anti-Corruption Dialogue between international donors and the Vietnamese Government Inspectorate and other agencies Thursday in Hanoi.

In poor health

“Corruption deprives people from access to healthcare and can lead to wrong treatments being given. Corruption in the health sector hits people when they are most vulnerable and the only way out is to pay in order to get the health service you need,” Swedish Ambassador Rolf Bergman said at the meeting.

The three key corruption-prone areas included state management, service delivery at the health facility and health worker-patient relations, and the management of health-insurance, said Dr. Thaveeporn Vasavakul, referring to a Sweden-sponsored study on corruption in the health sector in Vietnam.

The media has exposed several scams in the health sector during the last two years, highlighting the severity of the problem in Vietnam, according to Jairo Acuna-Alfaro, the UN Development Program (UNDP) Policy Advisor on Public Administration Reform and Anticorruption.

Of the exposés by six major media outlets, that of abusing patients take the majority, accounting 21 percent, AcunaAlfaro said.

Corruption by raising medicine prices to gain commissions also accounted for 18 percent, second on the list.

Doctors who overprescribe and over test patients are driving up healthcare costs for ordinary citizens around the country, the Health Ministry admitted at a teleconference in June.

For example, hospitals in Hanoi used more than VND1 trillion ($54 million) worth of drugs last year but many kinds of drugs prescribed were only supportive drugs, not real treatments, health experts said. It is a waste of money because those drugs are not necessary, they added.

In 2008, medicine expenditures accounted for 45 to 60 percent of all hospitalization costs, the Health Ministry found.

“The root cause is that health staff want to receive commissions from the drugs companies,” Phap Luat (Law) newspaper quoted Ly Ngoc Kinh, the then Health Ministry’s Treatment Department Head, as saying in August.

Patients have also been coaxed into using more medicines than they would need.

While the World Health Organization warns each patient should not be treated with more than five types of medicines, the Health Ministry’s investigation showed 41 percent of patients were treated with combined antibiotics, 7.7 percent received three types of antibiotics, 10 percent received 11 – 15 types of medicine and 1.7 percent received over 16 types of medicines.

Other corrupt practices in the health sector include personal gains from health insurance funds, providing access to modern equipment based on payment by patients, bribes in the process of licensing and mismanagement of public health properties as well as donations.

Given the pervasiveness of corruption in the health sector, no one is immune from the grave consequences of this endemic problem, Bergman said.

“Not only poor people are affected... Corruption in the pharmaceutical chain can also prove deadly, where anybody can be a victim.”

No single measure

There was consensus at the meeting that the Vietnamese government should keep a closer eye on the procurement of health equipment at hospitals.

The management capability and accountability of hospital authorities should also be improved to stop the informal payment system between doctors and patients, participants agreed.

The fight against corruption in the health sector would not be easy and would need concerted efforts from different parties, Bergman said.

“We can never point out one single measure - it is the combination of laws, implementation, monitoring and change in individual behavior that can lead to success.”

VietNamNet/TN

[AdGuy]

Originally Posted by AdGuy

Rest assured it'll be in the next series

Dear bros,

We have updated the following songs in the forum, some of which are dedications from our bros.

I really like this series. It's got some really nice love songs in there.

Enjoy!

With this batch, we have concluded our phase 1 trial. I look forward to your continuous support.

Click here for the following:

Anh Yêu Em Nhiều Lắm
Chim Trắng Mồ Côi
Đã Không Yêu Thì Thôi
Chỉ Có Thể Là Tình Yêu
Huyền Thoại Tình Yêu
Giọt Sương
Mãi Là Người Đến Sau
Ngỡ Như Giấc Mơ
Làm Sao Em Biết
Làm Sao Anh Biết
Người Đến Sau
Nước Mắt Kẻ Đa Tình
Tình Yêu Diệu Kỳ
Sao Anh Ra Đi
Sorry - Bao Thy

[jackbl]

Bed sharing in VN’s hospitals prompts investment call
================================================

VietNamNet Bridge – Patients sharing a single bed or sleeping in corridors at central hospitals is still a normal sight in Vietnamese hospitals.


Now, following a meeting with the Health Ministry’s officials on November 23, PM Nguyen Tan Dung has asked the health sector to further invest in grassroots hospitals and increase patient beds.

According to VNExpress online newspaper, around 40-50 patients had to lie on stretchers in the corridor of the Hanoi-based Viet Duc Hospital’s Trauma – Orthopedics Ward on November 23.

The ward’s chief, doctor Ngo Van Toan said they were victims of accidents. They were bandaged already but they have to wait for free operating-tables. “I can’t say how long they have to wait,” Toan said.

According to the doctor, patients with broken legs and broken bones had to wait because priority was given to more serious cases. After surgery, many had to lie on stretchers in the corridor because the ward didn’t have enough beds for them.

This situation was similar at the National Hospital for Infectious and Tropical Diseases in Hanoi. From the second to the fourth floors, patients lay in corridors, mainly dengue fever patients.

The number of examination rooms had increased from two to six, but an announcement was posted: priority to serious cases, not in registration order.

The Central Pediatrics Hospitals is always overloaded with patients. Around 2-3 children share a bed and up to 4-5 in emergency wards.

PM Nguyen Tan Dung asked the Health Ministry to invest in hospitals in provinces and districts and to increase the number of beds to 25/10,000 residents by 2015.

According to the Health Ministry, the occupancy rate of patient beds in big hospitals in Hanoi and HCM City is up to 200-250 percent. The overload at these hospitals is around 130 percent or up to 300 percent at hematology and growth-cancer wards.

The Health Ministry said that Vietnam currently has only 18 patient beds per 10,000 people and may hospitals at district levels are poorly equipped.

In addition, the imbalance of income between doctors in cities and doctors at provincial and district-level hospitals means skilled doctors tend to leave grassroots hospitals. Patients, as a result, don’t want to be treated locally.


The Health Ministry plans to build ten more hospitals in Hanoi.

PV

[jackbl]

Corruption rampant in health industry
=======================================

VietNamNet Bridge - Bribery has been so common at Vietnamese hospitals for so long that many people don’t even consider it corruption, experts told a healthcare conference in Hanoi Tuesday.

Up to 70 percent of health workers in Vietnam are involved in ethically-questionable medical practices and nine percent of them take bribes during patients’ treatment, UNDP policy advisor Jairo Acuna-Alfaro quoted a report by Hanoi University of Medicine as saying.

Dang Ngoc Dinh, director of the Center of Community Research and Development at the Vietnam Union of Science and Technology Association, agreed with the statement.

He said many patients he had surveyed recently said they believed it was not wrong to give doctors “under-the-table” money while doctors considered it a “clean” source of income.

The Hanoi University of Medicine report showed that up to 37 percent of those surveyed said they did not consider health workers taking “extra” money or gifts after doing their jobs as corruption.

Eighteen percent said it was hard to tell what is and is not corruption, according to the report, which didn’t say how many people were surveyed.

World Bank representative Martin Rama, meanwhile, said corruption in the health industry was hurting the poor, who already had difficulty affording treatment fees.

However, Tran Quang Trung, chief inspectorate of the Ministry of Health, didn’t agree that the problem was so widespread. He said that out of 200,000 health workers, there were bound to be some rotten apples.

The conference also reviewed a World Bank report on competitiveness in Vietnam’s drug market, which showed that pharmaceutical sales representatives and drug distributors were collaborating to fix drug prices while also paying doctors commissions to recommend and prescribe their most expensive products.

A representative from the Asian Development Bank said drugs in Vietnam are the most expensive in Southeast Asian region due to commissions paid to pharmacists and doctors who push expensive medicine.

VietNamNet/Thanh Nien/Nguoi Lao Dong

[jackbl]

Now vietnamese gambling also go high-tech liao

Part I: Online gambling investigation
===============================================

VietNamNet Bridge – Gamblers don’t need to find a game anymore – just a computer.

One local site is enjoying such a boom that nearly 2,000 people a day are joining. It’s further fuelled by the fact that people who introduce friends are earning extra credits.

Once online it’s a simple job to set up an account and winnings are transferred to bank accounts.

Like other online gambling sites, this gambling website for Vietnamese allows players to register an account very easily but these beginners can only play small games. To participate in major gambles, they have to pay at least $20 for a “never-die account”. $20 is equivalent to 10 bills in the virtual account.

Online gambler LTN said that 10 bills is enough to play several games of cards. He says that many people buy multiple accounts in order to avoid interruption to games.

LTN believes the server master sells around 400-500 accounts per day.

After buying “never-die accounts”, players can join various kinds of gambling like domino, cards, Chinese dice and others and chat with other gamblers. There are up to 100 casinos for Texas hold ’em and card playing on this site. Each casino is for a type of accounts, depending on the bills inside.

L.T.N said each account worth 10 bills is called “suckling pig”, 100 bills as “golden pig”, 200 bills as “golden cabinet”, 500 bills as “golden car” and 1000 bills as “golden castle”. The VIP casinos are for “golden castle” gamblers, who are mainly Vietnamese overseas in the US, Canada, Australia and South Korea.


Virtual accounts, burning real cash

At a casino for “golden cabinet” gambling, it is very easy to lose 100 bills/game (equivalent to nearly $180). Casinos of this kind are the most popular on the site.

L.T.N gambled till he reached a stage where he could take the place of a gambler who had lost a 500 bills slot. However he quickly learned his lesson in one room.

“I had to move to another room. This room has at least five old foxes which have played on this site for at least three years, who are specialized in wring money from the new comers,” he said.

The room for “golden castle” players is opened each several weeks. The winners can earn up to several thousands USD at a time.


According to LTN, rumors on the site are always suggesting that someone has won enough to buy a car or even a house. Whether they are true or not they continue to attract lure new gamblers.

“Golden castle” players soon become famous in the online community of Vietnamese gamblers. This “virtual fame” has urged many rich men to buy “golden castles” simply as a status symbol.

VietNamNet/Tuoi Tre

[jackbl]

Getting close to online casinos
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VietNamNet Bridge – Previously, to gamble online, players had to contact agencies in Vietnam and pay fees to “bosses” – but now it is much simpler.


A gambling website.

“You only need to go online to directly make contact with the bankers through e-transaction, dubbed ‘magic wands’ by gamblers,” said former “boss” LTT, who worked as agency for many gambling websites.

However, LTT suggested a site for Tuoi Tre’s reporter to visit.



Seeking magic wand

According to LTT, this site quickly offers “magic wand” or “e banking card”. With this card, players can gamble easily and don’t have to pay commission to agencies. With only one USD, you can bet against the banker.

Following LTT’s guidance, Tuoi Tre’s reporter opened an account with an ATM card at the Bank for Foreign Trade of Vietnam (Vietcombank). Some bankers only accept debit cards from this bank (Visa Debit).

After getting the card, LTT instructed the reporter to register for the bank’s e-banking service. He hen helped set up an account at the online gambling site.

To be accepted players have to show a scan of their ID cards, a document proving they can transfer money from their Vietcombank account to a web account and the front of their Vietcombank card.

Two hours after making a transaction to transfer $50 from the Vietcombank card to the online account, the reporter was informed by email that he was now able to log into the site to gamble.

With many Vietnamese gamblers, this site has five languages, including Vietnamese. The website offers various kinds of betting, from football to basketball, badminton, tennis and also stock indexes of the world.

LTT is the “captain” of Club DLTCL, the name of a group of online betters. This group hired a guest house and an Internet line to gamble. Their account always has over 100 million dong and they earn their living by online betting and commissions from new gamblers.

Spending a whole night with this group to see how they bet online, a Tuoi Tre’s reporter witnessed them losing nearly 50 million dong.

Tuoi Tre asked an official of the Vietcombank why banks transfer money to overseas betting accounts, Trinh Thuong Thuc, chief of the credit card service department, said that only if the government bans people from using bank cards for online payment, can the bank can stop transferring money to online accounts.

He said that whenever its clients use e-banking services, Vietcombank has to pay at client’s request. The payment system works automatically. The bank doesn’t have the right to refuse transactions.

Another option, E-purse is now offered at almost all banks in Vietnam. From this “purse”, clients can use Visa Debit cards to transfer money to any betting accounts in the world.

Dinh The Hien, director of the Institute for IT and Application Economics, said that online betting and gambling is very popular but it is impossible to prevent it. To control online betting, e-banking services must be controlled and this will affect people’s banking transaction in general.

According to AFP, there are around 15,000 sports betting websites, including over 13,000 illegal sites. Their turnover is up to 15 billion euros a year ($23.6 billion). Most of the sites are based in Euro.

A research by an IT security consulting firm named ISSC recently warned that behind many illegal betting sites are criminal gangs.



Other tricks

As the number of online gambling sites rise – so do their victims.

Besides online casinos for Vietnamese professional gamblers, internet users can take part in online games on many websites – a fact confirmed by online gambler H.

With just a few clicks, H became a member of one Vietnamese website. This web supplies new members with virtual coins called gold. To get higher level in the game, players have to try to earn 100,000 gold, 1 million gold or even 100 million gold to become a big player. If they lose the free gold, they will have to exchange real money for virtual gold to continue the game. 10 million gold is equivalent to 50,000 Vietnam dong.

T, an online gambler said that every form of gamble is available on the internet, even popular online games in Vietnam as MU, Sword man, Thien Long Bat Bo, etc. are associated with betting.

He explained that in online games, players can only gamble with virtual money and can only exchange real money into virtual coins. In FPT’s MU game, players can make football bets.

In online games, there are two kinds of ratings: rating in terms of level and in terms of wealth, both associated with betting or gamble.

To serve online gamblers, there are a whole host of service websites attracting visitors with slogans like “How to make much money”, “The most accurate lottery forecast system”, “Football matches that will surely make you win in betting”, etc.

If one clicks to these slogans, he will see “To know the most accurate prediction of tonight’s lottery result, please send message to 6xxx” or “Secret information from lottery spinning room, type SOI and send to 6xxxx”.

After sending a text message by phone to this number, one receives the following message: “Thank you for using our service. We don’t have the latest forecast yet. We will send it to you immediately when we get it” while he pays 3,000-5,000 dong in his phone account.



Victims of online gambles

T is a member of hoancanh.com, a group of addicted online gamblers. This man and his group opened an account for football betting in central Thanh Hoa province. T owed over 500 million dong (over $30,000) and he had to flee to Saigon.

In T’s group was K, who was an excellent student of HCM City-based Ton Duc Thang University and V, a former student of the HCM City University of Natural Sciences. At the beginning, both of them just tried online gaming. Gradually, they have become gambling addicts and they quit university to devote more time to the online world.

To have money for online gambles, K started selling druges – later he became an addict himself. He currently lives at the foot of Saigon Bridge.

“My parents abandoned me two years ago. I want to give up everything to make a new life but it is so difficult because I’m stopped by debts and drugs,” K said.

V is no longer a student but he lies to his parents that he is in order to receive money for online gambling. “I’ve asked my parents to give me 10 million dong for my master course,” he said. V said that he had tried to give up online gambling several times but has so far failed.

Another group of online gamblers – DLTCL club – in District 10 is another example. The group’s leader is an engineer, who had to change jobs several times because of being fired as a result of spending too much time spent playing online games.

All members of this group lost assets like mobile phones, motorbikes and even houses to online gambling. Some have convictions relating to robbery or burglary.

In June 2008, a man in Tan Phu district, HCM City committed suicide after failed online sport bet.

A family in Tan Binh district recently had to ask for police’s protection because a family member lost an online bet worth 200 million. He couldn’t pay the bet and his family were threatened by a gang.

Recently, two men who were born in 1987 in District 11 jumped into the river because they couldn’t pay for an online bet.

Senior Lieutenant Vo Duy Thang from the HCM City Police Agency said that online gambling is a hi-tech crime, which develops in big cities like Hanoi, HCM City and Hai Phong. It is very difficult for police to combat it as evidence is also “virtual”.

However, police have discovered many online gambling gangs.

VietNamNet/Tuoi Tre

Originally Posted by jackbl

Now vietnamese gambling also go high-tech liao

Part I: Online gambling investigation
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