DKSH, a leading market expansion service provider in Asia and beyond, in collaboration with FrontierView, a business intelligence and advisory firm, released its latest whitepaper titled “Vietnam’s Rapidly Growing Healthcare Market: How Evolving Patient Access Dynamics Are Supporting Rapid Growth.” The whitepaper, a result of a closed-door executive roundtable encompassing key healthcare leaders and FrontierView’s independent research, provides valuable insights into Vietnam’s evolving healthcare market, aiming to identify opportunities to accelerate investment in the region’s healthcare systems. This study reflects DKSH’s commitment to helping global healthcare companies navigate Vietnam’s dynamic and complex healthcare landscape.

Vietnam is rapidly emerging as one of the most dynamic markets in the region, capturing the attention of investors and industry leaders alike. As a country with robust growth potential, it has firmly established itself on the radar of global business players looking to capitalize on its expanding opportunities. Vietnam is one of the only markets to have seen a YoY% increase in foreign direct investment (FDI) in the first half of 2024 among the Southeast Asia markets.  Despite challenges like delays in marketing authorizations, slow reimbursement expansion, and increasing localization pressures, the market remains resilient. The whitepaper views these challenges as opportunities for investors to drive change, enhance patient access, and contribute to Vietnam’s healthcare development.

The whitepaper also highlights the public sector’s efforts to improve healthcare efficiency and management via healthcare decentralization plan and public-private partnership (PPP) projects to overcome some of the persistent challenges in recent years exacerbated by the pandemic, including staffing constraints, major delays in infrastructure projects, limited benefits expansion, and procurement bottlenecks. Provincial governments are also enhancing healthcare accessibility by prioritizing primary care and expanding benefits. Recent amendments to the Law on Health Insurance aim to boost funding by shifting funds from administrative to medical treatment budgets and bolster benefits coverage by covering at least 50% of outpatient costs starting July 2025.

In the private sector, foreign investment is accelerating, with notable entries of numerous international investors in just the last year and a half. It is expected that Vietnam will likely follow a similar trend to that of several Southeast Asia markets, where patients will increasingly seek private care, as well as physicians migrate to private facilities and increasingly moonlight at private hospitals to augment their public sector incomes. PPPs are further expediting healthcare facility development, while the growing focus on medical tourism, supported by government initiatives, is benefiting private providers and promoting premium healthcare services. While key trends fueling private healthcare growth are set to continue, the uptake of private insurance remains a challenge. In 2023, Vietnam’s healthcare expenditure was 41% out-of-pocket, while commercial insurance accounted for only 4%. Similar to investment in the hospital space, it is also expected that investment in the retail pharmacy space will accelerate as well, which will push the sector towards more consolidation.

The whitepaper also recommends multiple opportunities for healthcare companies to contribute to Vietnam’s growth, including partnering on healthcare professional training, advancing primary care and care decentralization with digital health solutions, and leveraging AI to boost efficiency and address local challenges in collaboration with the health-tech startup ecosystem.

Bijay Singh, lead of Business Unit Healthcare, DKSH, stated: “At DKSH, we are committed to enriching people’s lives by providing healthcare for all, including Vietnam. We recognize the unique challenges of growing healthcare efforts in this dynamic and rapidly evolving market. With over a century of experience as a trusted partner in Asia and nearly 35 years in Vietnam, we have developed a deep understanding of navigating and thriving in local contexts. In partnership with FrontierView, we are excited that our contribution via this whitepaper brings valuable insights and strategies to help our healthcare partners succeed in Vietnam and beyond."

Alec Lee, Managing Director, Healthcare Research at FrontierView shared: “The excitement about the opportunity to rapidly expand access to high-value health technology in Vietnam is palpable amongst executives, it is one of the few countries globally that is expected to show true growth potential in the coming years. With a population over 100 million, a rapidly developing economy, and a government focused on improving access, the time to invest is now.”

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