Operating rooms at Children’s Hospital No. 2 are overloaded by some 40 patients a day.

Overcrowded inner city hospitals have not been renovated, thanks to a 2007 Ho Chi Minh City People’s Committee decision to only remodel hospitals, universities, colleges and high schools in outlying districts.

Though the HCMC People’s Committee has granted VND60 billion to upgrade the Saigon Ear, Nose and Throat Hospital, improvements have gone undone due to the decision.

“We are struggling to cope with the issue of overcrowding,” said hospital director Nguyen Thi Ngoc Dung, according to a report from online news service VietnamNet.

Children’s Hospital No. 2 has a similar problem. Operating rooms at the hospital, which was built during the French colonial period, are overloaded by some 40 patients a day.

“The hospital could collapse at anytime,” VietnamNet quoted hospital director Ha Manh Tuan as saying.

The People’s Council Economy and Budget Board Chief Truong Nguyen Minh Hoang vowed to amend the decision at the meeting, according to the report.

Reported by Thanh Tung