Coronavirus: China pushes local health authorities to keep rural populations safe from wave of infection

Name: Excitement and anxiety as China starts to reopen after zero-Covid
Uploaded: 2022-12-12T08:03:27.000Z
Duration: 4 min 41 s
Description: Excitement and anxiety as China starts to reopen after zero-Covid

Joint Prevention and Control Mechanism of the State Council directs rural hospitals and clinics to guarantee pandemic medical services

Move to treat asymptomatic and mild cases at home and transfer severe and critical cases to designated or higher-tier hospitals

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Currently, every 1,000 people in China’s rural areas have access to 1.48 doctors, far less than in cities. Photo: Xinhua

Xinlu Liang

Published: 4:03pm, 12 Dec 2022Updated: 4:57pm, 12 Dec 2022

Beijing has urged local governments to upgrade their medical capacity to protect China’s rural population from the severe outcomes of Covid-19 as the country meets a wave of infections.

In a directive on Sunday, the Joint Prevention and Control Mechanism of the State Council asked rural hospitals and clinics to ensure pandemic medical services and timely treatment for high-risk patients, such as the elderly and people with underlying diseases.

“Rural areas should … improve the ability of county-level hospitals to treat severe cases, and give full play to the role of health monitoring in township hospitals and village clinics to minimise the severity rate and mortality rate,” the directive said.

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Excitement and anxiety as China starts to reopen after zero-Covid

Since last week, China has largely abandoned its draconian pandemic restrictions. Hospitals across the country have seen a surge in infections in the community while preparing for an expected influx of Covid-19 cases to come through the door.

But with unevenly distributed medical resources, China will struggle to deal with the waves ahead. Its highest tier hospitals are limited to large cities while rural areas – home to about 36 per cent of China’s 1.4 billion people – have only lower level hospitals and township clinics designed for immediate care.

The directive on Sunday asked rural hospitals to modify their healthcare system to link the three levels of county, township, and village, and to get support from hospitals ranked from second-tier urban general hospitals up to county-level hospitals.

The directive urged provincial hospitals to set up a work team to inspect rural areas, send professionals and establish an online medical collaboration network with county hospitals to improve pandemic management in rural areas.