Maternal health services will be delivered to women in underdeveloped areas as a motorcade of 40 donated medical vans set off from Beijing on Wednesday.

The "Mother's Health Express" program, launched by the All-China Women's Federation in 2003, delivers health examinations, treatments and maternal health services to women through "hospitals on wheels."

The 40 vans will reach needy women in Inner Mongolia, Hebei, Hunan and the Xinjiang Production and Construction Corps.

In 2014, the program conducted 73,000 health check-ups and 29,000 free consultations.

In another development, five ophthalmological operation vans were donated to China Disabled Persons' Federation (CDPF) to offer free cataract operations to patients in poor regions.

The mobile operation services belong to a program jointly organized by the CDPF and the Asian Foundation for the Prevention of Blindness.

Since the program's launch in 1996, it has already provided eye operations for about 400,000 patients.