From barefoot doctors to medical giants: how one town grew to dominate China’s private hospitals
The Putian network has grown from treating venereal diseases to an informal web of thousands of medical centres across the country
It all started when “doctors” with no proper medical training from the coastal town of Putian in Fujian province posted outdoor ads offering to treat people too embarrassed to go to public hospitals for proper treatment for venereal diseases.
Three decades later, and the Putian natives – who are commonly known as the Putian Gang– control more than 80 per cent of the mainland’s private hospitals, and have close ties with military medical centres.
That network is now at the centre of allegations that it provided unsuccessful experimental cancer treatment to 21-year-old student Wei Zexi who died last month. The student had sought the treatment at the No 2 Hospital of the Beijing Armed Police Corps and the authorities are investigating claims the hospital outsourced services to the group.
It is just the latest cloud over the group over the years.
“Most of the so-called Putian doctors came from Dongzhuang township and had no medical training. They were very active in dermatology 30 years ago,” said Zhan Guoqing, board member of Chengdu Maria Medical Investment Group. “People talk of Putian and immediately they think of unqualified barefoot doctors, even though it was decades ago.”
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Zhan is one of many Putian natives investing the medical sector, with stakes in high-end maternity hospitals and dental clinics in Chengdu, Beijing and Shanghai.