Vietnam proposes raising health insurance contributions to 5.1% from 2027

Vietnam’s Health Ministry is proposing a staged increase in health insurance contributions, beginning with a rise from 4.5% to 5.1% in 2027 and eventually reaching 6%.

For employees covered through their employment, the proposed 5.1% monthly contribution would take effect on July 1, 2027. The rate would apply to the salary used to calculate compulsory social insurance contributions. Employers would pay two-thirds, while employees would pay one-third.

The same rate would apply to pensioners, people receiving work-capacity-loss benefits and unemployment-benefit recipients, based on their respective payments. Groups whose contributions come from the state budget would pay 5.1% of the statutory base salary from the same date.

Using a base salary of 2.53 million Vietnamese dong from July 1, 2026, the current 4.5% contribution equals 113,850 dong per month. At 5.1%, it would rise to 129,030 dong, an increase of about 15,000 dong. The amount would change if the base salary changes.

The draft proposes applying the 5.1% rate to partly subsidized groups and household participants from Jan. 1, 2028. Household discounts would remain: the first member would pay the full amount, while the second, third and fourth would pay 70%, 60% and 50%, respectively. Each member from the fifth onward would pay 40%. Three years after the new rate begins, contributions would rise to 5.4%, followed three years later by 6%. The ministry frames the increases as part of a broader plan to expand covered benefits, including periodic health checks, screening for eight cancers and hepatitis B and C, chronic-disease prevention and nutrition services.