Doctor Do Gia Canh in a laboratory making vaccines in the United States . Doctor Canh and Alison Rapoport, an international volunteer, supervise and instruct students how to monitor vaccine effects. Working with American experts. Watching a nurse’s vaccine injection. During a trip to the remote district of Ba Thuoc in Thanh Hoa Province . A simple, friendly and benevolent man. That is how many people describe Doctor Do Gia Canh, Deputy General Secretary of the Vietnam Preventive Health Association and a member of the World Federation of Public Health Associations. He has been selected as “Man of the Year” in medicine and healthcare by the American Biographical Institute for his contribution of many excellent scientific projects to Vietnam and the world. Over the past 15 years, Doctor Do Gia Canh and his colleagues have regularly co-operated with the US National Institute of Health (NIH), the US Food and Drug Administration (FDA), the International Vaccine Institute and the World Health Organization (WHO) to successfully organize many programmes on public healthcare, such as prevention of diarrhea, research and testing of new vaccines and vaccination programmes for children, students and people in difficult and remote areas, helping reduce the rate of people infected with diarrhea and epidemic diseases. Doctor Do Gia Canh was one of the initiators and organizers of the international co-operation in “Good Clinical Practice” (GCP) - a very important principle in researching and assessing the quality of medicines and vaccines before putting them into use in Vietnam . He has also participated in many projects on researching and producing vaccines in Vietnam , such as the typhoid vaccine for children of between 2-5 years old and an oral diarrhea vaccine. Dozens of his research projects have been published domestically and 34 scientific projects have been published in the world’s medical magazines and put into practice. Do Gia Canh has spent many years researching a new formula for the oral diarrhea vaccine with the aim of curbing the disease. He said: “We have proven to the world that Vietnam has collaborated well with other developing countries to prevent and fight dangerous diseases, such as SARS, H5N1, avian influenza and others”. The research and development of vaccines are not only significant to Vietnam but also help prevent the epidemics worldwide. Doctor Canh confided: “My current successes are attributed to the Institute of Hygiene and Epidemiology which has over 60 years of development and contributions from renowned people of the preventive health sector. The institute has provided a good foundation for me to promote my career”. Canh and his colleagues have made thousands of field trips to poor localities throughout the country. His research projects, particularly in the field of preventing and fighting cancer and cholera, are closely connected with people’s lives, helping to effectively prevent an outbreak of diseases. I had an opportunity to follow him and his colleagues during their field trip to examine and instruct the students on the use of the vaccines at Hop Dong Secondary School in Hoa Binh Province .  He cared about all people, instructed the doctors and nurses to practise their work and gave a basic knowledge of how to best use the medicines to over 1,000 students and teachers at the school. Apart from undertaking research and giving medical check-up and treatment to poor people, doctor Do Gia Canh is interested in art and has a hobby of collecting stones and pictures. For him, it is a way to relax and discover the beauty of nature. At present he is researching a project to develop a vaccine that will prevent cervical cancer. If successful, the project will bring a much needed benefit to the women in the world. Doctor Do Gia Canh (October 2008). Story by Bich Van - Photos by Nam Suong & File