Factors affecting the implementation of health legislation and its impact on the rural poor in China: a case study of implementation of the maternal and infant health care law in two poor counties

This paper presents and discusses a case study of health legislation in China. In the transition to a market economy, legislation has been developed to offset the weakening in the central planning mechanism and political control that have historically influenced the behaviour of institutions and individuals in the Ministry of Health. There has been relatively little empirical examination of the implementation and impact of legislation as a tool for influencing health service provision in low-income countries. The study aimed to contribute towards filling this gap by exploring the factors affecting the implementation and impact of the Maternal and Infant Health Care Law, through a case study of two poor, rural counties in Chongqing municipality, China. The study found that key local actors perceive health legislation to be an important tool for safeguarding access to essential health care. However, the implementation of health legislation is inevitably a political process. The study illustrates the difficulties involved in efforts to influence provider behaviour through a national level legislative framework in a situation of decentralization of control over those providers, due to extreme regional variation in economic situations and limited resource inputs from the centre. Lessons are drawn for Chinese and international policy makers.     

妇幼保健机构内部控制的现状及思考

随着我国市场经济的发展,国家在妇幼保健机构投入资金大幅提高,如何利用内部控制提高管理水平,使资金效益达到最大化,是妇幼保健机构管理者提高风险意识,加强风险管理的客观需要,也是衡量单位管理的重要标志。本文结合工作实际,分析了目前妇幼保健机构内部控制的现状及存在问题,并在此基础上对如何加强内部控制进行了探讨。     

Equity in health and health care: the Chinese experience.

This paper examines the changes in equality of health and health care in China during its transition from a command economy to market economy. Data from three national surveys in 1985, 1986, and 1993 are combined with complementary studies and analysis of major underlying economic and health care factors to compare changes in health status of urban and rural Chinese during the period of economic transition. Empirical evidence suggests a widening gap in health status between urban and rural residents in the transitional period, correlated with increasing gaps in income and health care utilization. These trends are associated with changes in health care financing and organization, including dramatic reduction of insurance cover for the rural population and relaxed public health. The Chinese experience demonstrates that health development does not automatically follow economic growth. China moves toward the 21st century with increasing inequality plaguing the health component of its social safety net system.     

Managing the unmanageable: public hospital systems

There are significant challenges to those who work in large public health care delivery systems: political imperatives; resource constraints; sometimes rigid personnel systems; and, the reality that everything occurs in a public forum. The fact that many nations are reviewing and, in some instances, restructuring their national health care systems, has added to the complexity and feeling of continual turbulence experienced by their managers. State run systems like that in the United Kingdom are introducing market forces to increase effectiveness and value for money; while market systems, like that in the United States, are increasing regulatory interventions to achieve the kind of cost control available to countries with large public systems which operate with global budgets. Public hospitals in the United States offer examples of public institutions operating in a highly competitive market environment. A decade of management changes undertaken to enhance the efficiency and effectiveness of the New York City Health and Hospitals Corporation (HHC), the largest public hospital system in the United States, is presented as a case study of public health services and public management in a market environment.     

China's evolving health care market: how doctors feel and what they think

This paper reports on a questionnaire survey and 12 focus groups conducted among doctors in three provinces of China, namely Guangdong, Shanxi, and Sichuan. The survey (N = 720) and focus group participants were drawn from both rural and urban areas, as well as public and private sectors, in equal numbers The aim was to gauge how Chinese doctors feel about themselves and what they think of the Chinese health care system. We found low satisfaction levels with own income (8%), job (27%), skill (30%), and other important aspects of their professional life. The health care system received only 32% approval rating. Quality of care and patient safety issues were major concerns, especially in the growing but poorly regulated private sector. The public sector came under criticism for its high fees and bad service quality. The feedback point to the need for an appropriate regulatory framework to guide the development of China's evolving health care market. A revitalized medical profession that is fully engaged in the reform process could also significantly impact the success of ongoing health care reform efforts.     

Health in China and India: a cross-country comparison in a context of rapid globalisation

China and India are similarly huge nations currently experiencing rapid economic growth, urbanisation and widening inequalities between rich and poor. They are dissimilar in terms of their political regimes, policies for population growth and ethnic composition and heterogeneity. This review compares health and health care in China and India within the framework of the epidemiological transition model and against the backdrop of globalisation. We identify similarities and differences in health situation. In general, for both countries, infectious diseases of the past sit alongside emerging infectious diseases and chronic illnesses associated with ageing societies, although the burden of infectious diseases is much higher in India. Whilst globalisation contributes to widening inequalities in health and health care in both countries--particularly with respect to increasing disparities between urban and rural areas and between rich and poor--there is evidence that local circumstances are important, especially with respect to the structure and financing of health care and the implementation of health policy. For example, India has huge problems providing even rudimentary health care to its large population of urban slum dwellers whilst China is struggling to re-establish universal rural health insurance. In terms of funding access to health care, the Chinese state has traditionally supported most costs, whereas private insurance has always played a major role in India, although recent changes in China have seen the burgeoning of private health care payments. China has, arguably, had more success than India in improving population health, although recent reforms have severely impacted upon the ability of the Chinese health care system to operate effectively. Both countries are experiencing a decline in the amount of government funding for health care and this is a major issue that must be addressed.     

市场经济下企业如何为职工提供医疗保险

计划经济体制下,几乎所有的城镇职工都在机关、事业单位或国有和集体企业工作,单位负责卫生服务筹资.随着我国市场经济转变,雇佣关系变得复杂.该文资料来自于机关、企、事业单位的调查,结果显示,国有企业的职工年龄结构偏大,离、退休人员较多,负担较重,而一些新建企业职工则较年轻,这些差别主要反映在卫生保健费用支出上,也影响着企业参加职工医疗保险制度的积极性.企业经济状况也是影响参保的因素之一.该文所描述的这些复杂的因素应在医疗保险改革政策制定中受到重视并加以解决.     

Regulating health care markets in China and India

Health care markets in China and India have expanded rapidly. The regulatory response has lagged behind in both countries and has followed a different pathway in each. Using the examples of front-line health providers and health insurance, this paper discusses how their different approaches have emerged from their own historical and political contexts and have led to different ways to address the main regulatory questions concerning quality of care, value for money, social agreement, and accountability. In both countries, the challenge is to build trust-based institutions that rely less on state-dominated approaches to regulation and involve other key actors.     

Health care in Hong Kong and mainland China: one country, two systems?

Hong Kong and Mainland China are undertaking health reform following recent economic fluctuations and Hong Kong's transformation to a Special Administrative Region of China in 1997. Despite spending only 4.7% of its Gross Domestic Product on health care, one third as much as in the United States, Hong Kong has developed health statistics comparable to those in leading western nations. In contrast, Mainland China's 3.6% of GDP expenditure on health is associated with health statistics and expenditures similar to those found in most developing countries. Hong Kong has adopted health care financing and organizational health systems that are commonly seen in centrally planned economies, while its economy functions as a highly capitalistic enterprise. In contrast, mainland China has integrated many features of health care systems associated with market economies, while its overall economy is largely centrally planned. In this paper we examine the policy factors associated with these disparate health systems and investigate whether they can be maintained according to the 'one country, two systems' approach that has been adopted by Chinese policy makers.     

Care access in rural areas: what leverage mechanisms do regulatory agencies have in a public system?

Based on observations of the government's vital role in enhancing rural health care accessibility, in this article, we analyze solutions implemented by Quebec's public health system by highlighting the limitations in incentives used to remedy the dearth of rural medical resources and the consequent interest in ameliorating health care accessibility through service integration. The current challenge lies in fostering cooperation between health care institutions not subject to market incentives and integrating private practice physicians into the public system. To this end, regulatory agencies in public systems use four main leverage mechanisms: formal power, economic power, influence, and commitment, as illustrated in an experiment conducted in rural Quebec.     

Building institutions for an effective health system: lessons from China's experience with rural health reform

This paper is concerned with the management of health system changes aimed at substantially increasing the access to safe and effective health services. It argues that an effective health sector relies on trust-based relationships between users, providers and funders of health services, and that one of the major challenges governments face is to construct institutional arrangements within which these relationships can be embedded. It presents the case of China, which is implementing an ambitious health reform, drawing on a series of visits to rural counties by the author over a 10-year period. It illustrates how the development of reform strategies has been a response both to the challenges arising from the transition to a market economy and the result of actions by different actors, which have led to the gradual creation of increasingly complex institutions. The overall direction of change has been strongly influenced by the efforts made by the political leadership to manage a transition to a modern economy which provides at least some basic benefits to all. The paper concludes that the key lessons for other countries from China's experience with health system reform are less about the detailed design of specific interventions than about its approach to the management of institution-building in a context of complexity and rapid change.     

美国长期照护服务体系对中国的启示

本文综述了美国长期照护服务体系的服务机构、服务方式和服务提供者及其角色。美国长期照护服务机构可提供长期入住照护、短期入住照护、成人日间照护及居家照护服务,服务方式逐渐从机构服务向居家与社区服务转变。长期照护服务由正式照料者和非正式照料者共同提供,正式照料者提供有偿服务,非正式家庭照料者以女儿(29.3%)和配偶(21.2%)为主,随着居家和社区服务可用性增加,家庭照料者与有偿的正式照料者分担长期照护的可能性更大。美国长期照护服务体系结构完善,准入机制严格且系统,强调服务质量和效果评价,且重视老年人个人意愿,尊重其服务偏好和选择权利。基于美国的经验,我国在探索长期照护服务体系时,应以居家和社区照护为主,充分发挥社区卫生服务机构、社会和家庭的力量,注重服务机构和内容的多样化,建立完善和详细的服务使用评估标准,强调服务质量的有效性评价,体现人性化。     

The emergence of proprietary medical facilities in China

This paper analyzes the evolution and development of market conditions and government policies that have favored the emergence of proprietary medical facilities in China. Excess and differentiated demand for medical services, the existent profitability and supply of the investment capital in health care market, and favorable government policies have encouraged the entrance of proprietary facilities in health care market. The paper further analyzes why nonprofit health organizations are not an optimal organizational form in the current Chinese health care market. After discussing the strengths and weaknesses of proprietary ownership in health care market in China, the paper concludes with important managerial and policy suggestions.     

Private initiatives and policy options: recent health system experience in India

In the recent past the impact of structural adjustment in the Indian health care sector has been felt in the reduction in central grants to States for public health and disease control programmes. This falling share of central grants has had a more pronounced impact on the poorer states, which have found it more difficult to raise local resources to compensate for this loss of revenue. With the continued pace of reforms, the likelihood of increasing State expenditure on the health care sector is limited in the future. As a result, a number of notable trends are appearing in the Indian health care sector. These include an increasing investment by non-resident Indians (NRIs) in the hospital industry, leading to a spurt in corporatization in the States of their original domicile and an increasing participation by multinational companies in diagnostics aiming to capture the potential of the Indian health insurance market. The policy responses to these private initiatives are reflected in measures comprising strategies to attract private sector participation and management inputs into primary health care centres (PHCs), privatization or semi-privatization of public health facilities such as non-clinical services in public hospitals, innovating ways to finance public health facilities through non-budgetary measures, and tax incentives by the State governments to encourage private sector investment in the health sector. Bearing in mind the vital importance of such market forces and policy responses in shaping the future health care scenario in India, this paper examines in detail both of these aspects and their implications for the Indian health care sector. The analysis indicates that despite the promising newly emerging atmosphere, there are limits to market forces; appropriate refinement in the role of government should be attempted to avoid undesirable consequences of rising costs, increasing inequity and consumer exploitation. This may require opening the health insurance market to multinational companies, the proper channelling of tax incentives to set up medical institutions in backward areas, and reinforcing appropriate regulatory mechanisms.     

Towards development of professional management in Indian hospitals

Hospitals consume the largest share of government health resources, yet, until recently, they have not been a focus of health policy and research in developing countries, where the resources are in negative proportion to the demands placed on services of health care institutions, and where the possibility of resources being increased in the short run is very remote, the only hope for the increase in the effectiveness of the health care system being the effective management of hospitals. A professional administrator with multidisciplinary training would ensure the optimal use of resources. We live in the age of perfection at all levels. Hence, professional training is the basic requirement for the personnel to function effectively in a hospital. Professional training is required to be imparted by the institutions specialised in professional training. Professional management has an immense scope and a bright future market on account of the increasing demand for specialised and quality health care. Better management or lack of it will determine the future of health service. This paper focuses on development of management and the requirement for professional administrators in India.     

Bringing a family practice model of health to the People's Republic of China

The health care system in the People's Republic of China (PRC) is undergoing a major transition that has made the government revise its approach to how medicine is taught and practiced. Family medicine, which provides a generalist approach to medical care, is at the forefront of this transition. This article reviews the recent history of medical education in the PRC, including the establishment of the discipline of family medicine in the mid 1980s, and factors promoting development of family medicine. These include the movement away from government-subsidized health care in hospital settings, the aging population, increased urbanization, increasing incidence of infectious diseases, and rising health care costs. We conclude from observations made in the PRC and from a review of secondary sources that family medicine in China is in its infancy. The value of understanding the role that family medicine plays within China's changing health care system is that we gain a broader perspective of the variety and growing international importance of family practice as a profession.     

On justice and social institutions in the health care sector

The distribution of health care is dominated by nonmarket social institutions. In health economics, this allocation pattern is explained by referring to market failures of bearing risks. Howe er, as health is a moral related phenomenon, the nonmarket distribution of health care cannot be explained from an economical point of iew alone. In this paper, we present two of the most influential current moral theories, John Rawls’s egalitarian and Robert Nozick’s liberal theories of justice, and how they ha e been applied to health care. We find that both egalitarians as well as liberals argue for nonmarket social institutions in the health care sector. Ob iously, there is a parallelism between social institutions due to market failures and those due to moral conictions. Due to this parallelism, health economists implicitly refer to non-economic arguments when they explain the coming into being of social institutions in the health care sector.     

Voluntary health insurance in the European Union: a critical assessment.

The authors examine the role and nature of the market for voluntary health insurance in the European Union and review the impact of public policy, at both the national and E.U. levels, on the development of this market in recent years. The conceptual framework, based on a model of industrial analysis, allows a wide range of policy questions regarding market structure, conduct, and performance. By analyzing these three aspects of the market for voluntary health insurance, the authors are also able to raise questions about the equity and efficiency of voluntary health insurance as a means of funding health care in the European Union. The analysis suggests that the market for voluntary health insurance in the European Union suffers from significant information failures that seriously limit its potential for competition or efficiency and also reduce equity. Substantial deregulation of the E.U. market for voluntary health insurance has stripped regulatory bodies of their power to protect consumers and poses interesting challenges for national regulators, particularly if the market is to expand in the future. In a deregulated environment, it is questionable whether this method of funding health care will encourage a more efficient and equitable allocation of resources.     

落实“十五”发展纲要 构筑新型卫生体系

该文全面阐述了实施《上海市卫生事业发展第十个五年计划纲要》的重要意义 ,进一步明确了实施《纲要》必须坚持以发展为主线 ,强调了改革是推进卫生事业发展的强大动力 ,法制和规制建设是卫生改革与发展的必要保障 ,并提出要正确处理好几个关系 :( 1 )正确处理好政府与市场的关系 ;( 2 )处理好公共卫生与医疗卫生的关系 ;( 3)处理好城市卫生与郊区卫生的关系 ;( 4 )处理好改革发展和规范合理的关系     

Recent Developments in Health Care Law: Culture and Controversy

This article reviews recent developments in health care law, focusing on controversy at the intersection of health care law and culture. The article addresses: emerging issues in federal regulatory oversight of the rapidly developing market in direct-to-consumer genetic testing, including questions about the role of government oversight and professional mediation of consumer choice; continuing controversies surrounding stem cell research and therapies and the implications of these controversies for healthcare institutions; a controversy in India arising at the intersection of abortion law and the rights of the disabled but implicating a broader set of cross-cultural issues; and the education of U.S. health care providers and lawyers in the theory and practice of cultural competency.