Objectives: Hospitals at both central and local levels in Vietnam have had cross-infection of patients and healthcare workers especially during COVID-19 pandemic. Decision No. 3088/QD-BYT was issued by the Minister of Health (MOH) of Vietnam to promulgate the set of criteria for safe hospitals to prevent COVID-19 and other acute respiratory infections. This study aims to describe the implementation of criteria for safety to prevent COVID-19 among public hospitals in Vietnam in 2020. Methods: A cross-sectional study, applied quantitative based on secondary data were extracted and analyzed from a recent survey of hospital safety conducted by MOH. Total of 1220 public hospitals were selected in this study. The study received ethics approval from the Hanoi Medical University. Results: The proportion of public hospitals classified as “safe hospital” was 91.3%, “safe hospital with moderate level” was 7.8% and “unsafe hospital” was 0.9%. The rate of “safe hospital” was lowest in the ministerial hospital group (82.2%), followed by district hospital (89.9%) and regional hospitals (93.0%). The rate of “safe hospital” was highest in the central level group (96.1%), provincial hospital (94.2%) and specialized hospitals (93.1%). Conclusions: Most hospitals in Vietnam had met the standards of safe hospitals according to Decision 3088/QD-BYT. This criteria was only one of the tools to help assess the ability of hospitals to prepare and respond to the COVID-19 pandemic. Ministry of Health should improve the criteria in Decision 3088/QD-BYT to be more suitable with the emerging new situation and threat of the pandemic and develop mechanisms and regulations that require hospitals to regularly report on disease preparation and response.