Dr. Bounfeng Phoummalaysith, a graduate from the first class of the Transnational Doctoral Programs for Leading Professionals in Asian Countries in the Graduate School of Medicine, was inaugurated to Minister of Health, Lao PDR. He entered the PhD program in 2014 and graduated in 2018. His PhD thesis was "Factors associated with routine immunization coverage of children under one year old in Lao People's Democratic Republic" published in the journal Vaccine (36; 2666-72, 2018). He is also a graduate from the Young Leaders' Program at Nagoya University Graduate School of Medicine, which is a one-year master course in the healthcare administration financially supported by Ministry of Education, Culture, Sports, Science and Technology, Japan.
He played an important role as the secretariat for the International Symposium: Health Systems Strengthening and Sustainable Financing towards Universal Health Coverage held at Vientiane in 2016. The symposium was chaired by the Minister of Health, Lao PDR and Nagoya University. After the symposium, he was promoted to director general, then vise-minister. At the 9th National Assembly on March 22-26, 2021, he was formally appointed to the Ministry of Health, Lao PDR. He is still current director of the Lao Branch of Nagoya University Alumni.
Dr. Bounfeng Phoummalaysith at the graduation ceremony in September, 2018