Medical Care in China

Current Medical Care in China

With the development of the economy, Chinese government continually tried to conduct the reform and innovation of the health and medical care system to improve the quality of the population.

Health and Medical Care System

To achieve the goal of universal coverage, the Chinese government carries out lots of strategies and measures which can be summarized as “four beams and eight pillars” (Si Liang Ba Zhu). The “four beams” includes public health care, medical care, health insurance and essential drugs (CHSI, 2009). The public health care is designed to achieve the equitable provision of basic public health programs to all residents. The medical care system will focus on improving health care quality and efficiency for all the residents. Health insurance, which includes the new rural cooperative medical scheme, the urban employee-based basic medical insurance scheme and the urban resident-based basic medical insurance scheme, will be strengthened by increasing government financial support and improving management. Finally, a system will be established to ensure the provision of essential drugs of a reasonable price and quality (Liu, 2002).

China currently has two medical systems

China currently has two medical systems: Traditional Chinese Medicine (TCM) originated and imported Western medicine. Traditional Chinese Medicine (TCM) originated in China well over 3000 years ago, and has since transferred to almost every corner of the world. Based on treatments which is attempt to restore the balance and harmony to the body, nearly a quarter of the world’s population use TCM as the first medical resort Today. Even the most Chinese hospitals have traditional Chinese medicine and western medicine (made in china) and imported medicine, the price of the Chinese medicine is much lower than the imported western medicine.

The big problem of the insurance system is that the imported medicines are very expensive and are...