China pledges crackdown on corruption in health insurance scheme

Top regulator to target misuse of funds, rent-seeking by management, bribery in pharmaceutical sales and ethics of medical personnel

The announcement comes amid a year-long anti-graft investigation into healthcare sector

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China’s health insurance fund is strained after three years of zero-Covid policies and a sluggish post-pandemic economic recovery. Photo: Xinhua

Published: 9:37pm, 15 Aug 2023Updated: 9:54pm, 15 Aug 2023

China’s top medical regulator pledged to crack down on corruption with a focus on the country’s health insurance scheme, according to a public statement issued on Tuesday.

The statement came as anti-graft investigators pressed ahead with a year-long campaign into the medical and pharmaceutical sectors.

The statement highlighted six areas for inspection, stressing that investigations would focus on a small number of people in the sector engaged in misconduct.

In addition to looking into the use of public health insurance funds, the campaign will also cover rent-seeking by administrators and management in the medical and pharmaceutical sectors, bribery in pharmaceutical and medical equipment sales and the ethical conduct of medical personnel, the statement said.

The campaign’s goal is to “carry out systemic rectification that covers all conspicuous problems of corruption in every area and field in the medical and pharmaceutical sectors so we can establish a host of enduring mechanisms to ensure the long-lasting results of our work,” a spokesman for the National Health Commission (NHC) said.

The NHC kicked off the campaign about three weeks ago to crack down on corruption in the medical sector, according to a statement it issued after a joint video conference with another nine agencies, including the National Audit Office and Ministry of Public Security.

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