Since 2004, China has sent medical teams to Timor-Leste to carry out medical cooperation every two years. In 2021, the ninth medical team (including He Lingna, Chief Physician of the Acupuncture Department of our hospital) from Sichuan Province to assist Timor-Leste set foot on this land with fascinating island scenery. After two years in Timor-Leste, the team was about to return home. On the eve of parting, they still worked as hard as they could.

The Democratic Republic of Timor-Leste is located at the eastern end of the Nusa Tenggara Islands in Southeast Asia, with a total area of 15,000 square kilometers. As one of the least developed countries identified by the United Nations, Timor-Leste has a total population of 1.34 million, but its number of hospital beds per thousand people is less than 0.4. Its medical resources are extremely scarce, and it is a country that the World Health Organization pays great attention to.

Faced with a severe shortage of medical resources in Timor-Leste, every member of the ninth Chinese medical team to assist Timor-Leste worked with all their might.

On October 23, 2023, President Jose Ramos-Horta of Timor-Leste presented the Presidential Medal of Honor to the members of the ninth Chinese medical team at the Presidential Palace.

On behalf of the government and people of Timor-Leste, President Jose Ramos-Horta thanked the ninth Chinese medical team for its outstanding work and selfless dedication over the past two years. He thanked the team members for overcoming difficulties and challenges, actively providing medical services to the local people, improving the local medical level, and making great contributions to the people of Timor-Leste, the humanitarian cause and the practical cooperation between China and Timor-Leste in the field of medical and health care.

The following video introduces He Lingna's experience in treating facial paralysis for local people. In two years, she cured more than 1,500 patients of facial paralysis and taught Chinese medicine to local students.

This video shows He Lingna teaching Chinese medicine to local students.

This video is a local news report on the ninth Chinese medical team to assist Timor-Leste.