Ho Chi Minh City’s Cho Ray Hospital will be the first one in southern Vietnam to conduct liver transplants on adult patients this July, it announced Friday.

Two patients, who have cirrhosis and liver cancer respectively, have been selected for the first surgeries this year. They are aged 32 and 57.

Funding for the two surgeries will come from the Health Ministry.

A liver transplant surgery is estimated to cost US$50,000 in Vietnam, much cheaper compared to South Korea ($100,000) and the US ($150,000-180,000).

The first liver transplant in the country was carried out in 2007. Since then, a total of 15 successful transplants have been conducted on adults in three hospitals based in Hanoi, and on a child patient in Ho Chi Minh City Children’s Hospital 2.

Liver transplants can expand cancer patients’ life by up to five years, and longer for other liver diseases, according to doctors at the Cho Ray Hospital.