[Canton Hospital and public health in Canton]

Canton Hospital was not only the most influential missionary hospital in South China, but also the first one brought the concept and practice of public health to Guangzhou. In the late Qing Dynasty, it conducted free vaccination, plague treatment, health education and so on, demonstrating the importance of public health to the people. In the period of the Republic of China, it extensively cooperated with the government and social organizations in developing school health, maternal and child health, communicable disease control and epidemiological investigations to actively serve the social group. In the 1930s, its public health activities extended towards the rural areas of Guangzhou, and promoted the convergence of rural and urban medical and health services. The three-level medical system that it built provided demonstration model for the establishment of Chinese rural medical system.