Xinhua News Agency reporter: We have noticed that the government work report of this year mentioned ‘medic-’ for 27 times, and clearly stated that efforts should be made to solve the difficulties in getting medical services. As the new medical reform has entered deep water in its 9th year, what do you think is the biggest difficulty? Thank you.
Liu Yucun (member of the National Committee of CPPCC): Thank you for the question. Health care system reform is a common problem worldwide. Nowadays two countries centered most on medical reform: one is the US, and the other is China. Three US presidents have all focused on medical reform and the trend continues. I think medical reform of US is still in progress. As the biggest developing country of the world, China has made huge efforts on the issue but there are still lots of problems. I would summarize the issue into three aspects:
First, there is a contradiction of limited financial input and ever-growing diversified demands. Compared with education which Minister Liu had just mentioned, the cost for medical treatment is a bottomless pit. The new technology, material and bio-medical products bring great costs for medical treatment. There are three kinds of countries in the world: some countries, represented by the US, pour 15%-17% of GDP into the field of medical treatment, but still cannot find a perfect solution for some problems, for example, 40 million American people do not have medical insurance; other countries, like Japan and Canada, use about 10% of its GDP to solve medical problems, but they are faced with efficiency problems; as an emerging economy, China puts 5%-10% into medical treatment. The growth of China’s financial investment seems not to be in proportion to the increase of demands and expectations. Financial support for medical treatment is never sufficient.
Second, there are differences between social evaluation and personal feelings. China has better social evaluation results on medical care than the average level of middle-income developed countries. For example, the average life span of China has increased by more than 1 year over the past decade; infant and maternal mortality rate was under control; medical insurance has covered 1.35 billion people; compared with SARS in 2003, huge improvement has been made in response speed and treatment capacity when the country is faced with major epidemics. All these are the great accomplishments of health care system reform in China. But ordinary people would focus more on the process of medical treatment, such as registration, outpatient service, hospitalization and other procedures, and in these fields there are still some unsolved problems. Therefore, there is a gap between personal feelings and the social evaluation criterions.
Third, it is hard to achieve the balance between the interest of different social groups. For instance, several years ago, 70% of the expenditure of Hong Kong Hospital Authority would be for medical staff and the other 30% for medicine, equipment, etc. Personnel compensation reform, as stressed in the government work report, should also include the guarantee for human resources and the establishment of the incentive mechanism for medical staff. I hope this reform will be fast and thorough to improve remuneration of medical staff and attract more talents into medical profession. From my observation, first-class high school graduates usually choose to study economics or law. But how can we feel relieved when the future health of China is not in the hands of top elites? To some extent the whole society should reflect on how to attract best talents into medical profession to focus on health of the whole nation and thus to further promote China’s international competitiveness in life sciences.
Written by: Pan Xuru
Edited by: Hu Rong
Source: PKU News (Chinese)
