Bong Son hospital, 2014

The Bong Son hospital in 2014. Opened in 1998, the current hospital stretches well beyond the footprint of the war-era facility staffed by New Zealand’s tri-services medical team. A Vietnamese nurse and Bong Son local, Miss Nga, briefly worked there with Kiwis during the war. She says the hospital wasn’t completely destroyed post-war, and was reopened by the north after the war’s end. It was abandoned through the 1980s in favour of developing district health centres, before being rebuilt and reopened in 1998. A major expansion project is planned for the hospital in coming years.