As Beijing continues its push to privatize its healthcare system, a shortage of doctors is increasingly becoming a problem, Reuters reported. Although nearly half of China’s 24,700 hospitals are private, a June Deutsche Bank report found that 84% of in-patients were still coming through public facilities. A major contributor to this disparity is the lack of doctors in the private sector, resulting largely from state-run hospitals refusing to let their doctors leave. Beijing has been taking steps to expand private care capacities by raising the threshold for foreign ownership of hospitals and allowing foreign investors to wholly own hospitals in seven cities and provinces.
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