Transformation of Health Care in China

The rapid, continuing decline in the cooperative medical system has affected several important elements of health care: the number of bare foot doctors per capita has diminished; most barefoot doctors forego continuing education; there has been an increase in the financial burden borne by peasants; and hospitals are experiencing financial problems.

Abstract

As a result of general economic reforms in 1980, the Chinese rural health-care system is undergoing rapid transformation. Ironically, modernization has inadvertently caused a once viable model health system to crumble. The cooperative medical system with barefoot doctors as its mainstay is being washed away on the tides of economic change. Several new arrangements are evolving out of the previous system.This article examines the evolving Chinese cooperative medical system, with the intention of garnering some valuable lessons for the Third World as well as for industrialized countries. The changes taking place in the Chinese health system were not planned. . . .