Photo: VCG

China is willing to strengthen post COVID-19 cooperation with ASEAN countries to boost their recovery, including the training of 1,000 health policy and professional and technical personnel for ASEAN members, a senior official from the country's National Health Commission (NHC) said at a China-ASEAN forum themed on health.

Cao Xuetao, deputy director of the NHC, said China wants to speed up the signing of the Memorandum of Understanding on health cooperation with ASEAN countries, and strengthen cooperation in the fight against COVID-19 so as to boost the regional recovery in the post pandemic era.

Meanwhile, a slew of practical cooperation projects in the fields of maternal and child health, traditional medicine, and occupational health are also on the agenda, according to Cao. In the next three years, China plans to train 1,000 health policy and professional and technical personnel for ASEAN countries, he said.

Health cooperation is one of the key highlights in China-ASEAN cooperation. The two have accumulated a vast amount of experience in building health cooperative platforms, joining hands fighting COVID-19 and the promotion of tradition medicines, Cao said at the meeting in Nanning, South China's Guangxi Zhuang Autonomous Region.

China is willing to continue the cooperation with ASEAN countries. To better utilize regional cooperative mechanisms and platforms, Cao suggested strengthening cooperation and coordination between the Healthy China 2030 Plan and the ASEAN Post-2015 Health Development Agenda. Cao also stressed deepening policy coordination to address major regional health incidents.

To better cope with public health crises, Cao called for countries to conduct more investment and optimize response mechanisms.

When the COVID-19 pandemic was still raging across the world in 2021, Chinese leaders said they were ready to work with ASEAN countries to jointly build a "health shield" for the region.

China not only promised to donate an additional 150 million doses of COVID vaccines to ASEAN countries to support higher vaccination rates, but also to contribute an additional $5 million to the COVID-19 ASEAN Response Fund. China will also step up joint vaccine production and technology transfer, and collaborate on the research and development of essential medicines, so as to help ASEAN increase its self-reliance.