Health chief airs concerns about huge sums required for reforms

The mainland's health chief voiced concern yesterday about the mammoth sums of money that local governments will have to raise for medical reforms that Premier Wen Jiabao stressed were in the public interest.

To smooth the way for the much-anticipated reforms, Mr Wen said in his annual work report that 850 billion yuan (HK$965 billion) would be injected into the system within three years. Beijing would come up with 331.8 billion yuan while the rest would come from grass-root governments, he said in his work report.

In an interview with CCTV, Health Minister Chen Zhu said his biggest concern was that 520 billion yuan would have to come from local governments.

'I think we need to show the greatest determination,' Mr Chen said. 'Although we need to cope with the financial crisis and have all kinds of difficulties, the medical reform also presents an important opportunity to boost domestic consumption and safeguard social welfare and even to drive the industrial development.'

The 850 billion yuan infusion, amounting to around 280 billion yuan per year, would significantly reduce patients' bills, Mr Chen said.

The country's total expenditure on public health rose to 1.1 trillion yuan in 2007 and was estimated at more than 1.2 trillion yuan last year. But, with the increased fiscal input, the share shouldered by residents dropped to less than 50 per cent from the peak of 60 per cent, Mr Chen said.

'The government has allocated more than 240 billion yuan [a year] and it will be more than 500 billion yuan if you count the additional 280 billion yuan,' Mr Chen said. 'I personally believe this will significantly reduce medical bills.'