Board of Directors of the ASEAN Center of Military Medicine approves plan for anti-COVID-19 exercise

(Bqp.vn) - On April 30 in Hanoi, Vietnam chaired the third teleconference with the Board of Directors of the ASEAN Center of Military Medicine (ACMM). Major General Nguyen Xuan Kien, Director of the Department of Military Medicine under the Vietnamese General Department of Logistics, Chairman of the Board, chaired the conference.

During the working session.

During the conference, ACMM’s Chief Secretary Major General Pramote Imwattana presented a draft of the plan. According to the plan, the exercise aims to learn from the experiences of military and medical forces in ASEAN member nations in the fight against COVID-19, to clarify coordination between the military and medical sectors, as well as other functional forces, to analyze shortcomings in the plan in response to the pandemic, and to build an action project to increase the preparedness of ASEAN’s military and medical forces in line with an anti-disease plan from the World Health Organization (WHO). On the basis of the draft plan, ASEAN member countries will define the roles and responsibilities of their military and medical sectors in the fight against the COVID-19 pandemic, map out fields in which they could join hands, or cooperate with other organizations in response to the disease, and reach a consensus on a cooperation mechanism among the forces and other organizations in the fight against COVID-19.

After the discussion session, the participants approved the exercise plan which consists of three mock situations. Concluding the conference, members of the ACMM’s Board of Directors agreed upon expected plans during the exercise in order to submit to the ASEAN+ Deputy Defence Ministers’ Meeting for approval. The exercise is scheduled to take place at the end of May.