An introduction to China's health care system

The Chinese health care system was originally a highly centralized one. It had great success in improving the people's health. The county-township-village three-tier health care system has contributed much to rural primary health care, and has set an example of primary health care to the developing nations. In the 1980s, this system experienced transformations along with the changes of the country's administrative system and economic policy. The transformations are characterized by the disintegration of the rural cooperative medical service, by the decentralization of township hospitals from county to township governments, by official permission for private practice, by the implementation of the personal responsibility system in health institutions, by the health security reform, and by the development of health insurance in rural areas. The long-existing health administrative problems which were aggravated in the last decade are the rural-urban differences in resource allocation and the large proportion of people without health security. With the increase of medical service prices in recent years due to the inflation of the whole economy, it is believed that the cost of health care will create an economic burden to the low-income, fee-for-service paying individuals and will further affect the health of the population. In the process of the national economic reform, it is an important and difficult task for the health administrators to adjust the health care system promptly and properly. Only by continuously carrying forward good traditions, correcting mistakes and consistently persisting in health reform, can China further raise its health care to a new, prosperous stage.