Korea, Mongolia restart health talks after eight years

South Korea's health ministry said Friday it held the seventh Korea-Mongolia Health and Medical Consultative Body meeting with Mongolia's health ministry, restarting a vice-ministerial channel that had been dormant for eight years.

The meeting was led by Second Vice Health Minister Lee Hyung-hoon and Erdenebayar Namjil, state secretary of Mongolia's health ministry. The two sides first established the consultative body under a 2011 health cooperation memorandum and ran it through a sixth round in 2018.

The centerpiece is a pilot training program for Mongolian medical staff. Starting Nov. 2, six Mongolian medical professionals will spend four weeks at Korean medical institutions, in a new team-based, multidisciplinary format focused on cancer and heart transplantation. The pilot, Seoul said, is the fruit of a medical training cooperation agreement signed in March, and the broader discussions rest on a Korea-Mongolia health and medical cooperation MOU revised and concluded in July.

"Through this consultative body, resumed after eight years, we have established a team-based training system to build the practical capacity of Mongolian medical staff and greatly expanded the scope of cooperation to digital health and pharmaceutical procurement," Lee said.

Seoul will also back Mongolia's drive to train 1,000 doctors and specialists, and help with the training and education of medical staff for Mongolia's second national cancer center, a priority project for Ulaanbaatar.

The ministry said it will keep cooperation channels open so Korean drug and biotech companies can take part in Mongolia's single-supplier public procurement bidding, while continuing support for quality assurance, testing and inspection capacity, and workforce training. Korea was Mongolia's third-largest source of pharmaceutical imports in 2025, at 12.3 percent, or 36.2 billion won ($27.1 million), behind Germany at 14.4 percent, or 42.5 billion won, and Slovenia at 13.6 percent, or 40.2 billion won.

Digital health is the other new pillar, spanning policy and governance, health information systems, digital health technology, cybersecurity and data protection, and workforce capacity building. The work draws on the AI basic care strategy the ministry announced on July 22.

"We will continue close cooperation so that the matters discussed can lead to better health for the Mongolian people and to the development of health care in both countries," Lee said.