China plans to expand its medical insurance programs over the next three years to cover all urban citizens, including children and the unemployed, a state news agency last week quoted Premier Wen Jiabao as saying.
China’s health care programs have been watered down in the last two decades, a period of massive economic reform in the country. Only employed urban residents have been able to join the national health insurance program.
Under the new program, to be financed by the central government, 200 million more urban residents will get health insurance.
Wen made expansion of health care one of the cornerstones of his keynote speech to the annual legislature meeting in March.
A pilot program will be launched in 79 cities by the end of September, Xinhua said.
“Different cities should develop a reasonable and practical policy for the pilot program in accordance with their own government revenue and living standards,” Wen was quoted as saying.
In his March speech, Wen pledged more support for health care in rural areas where 90 percent of the population has no health insurance and few have access to doctors. No details have been released.
China’s leaders are relying on the higher revenues to finance large increases in social spending.
Tax revenues jumped 30.6 percent in the first six months of the year to 2.6 trillion yuan (US$344 billion; euro250 billion), up more than 30 percent over the same period last year.
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