Poverty Alleviation of Ministry of Health

　　【Overview】  In November 1994, LGOP issued “Circular Concerning Fixed-Point Poverty Alleviation for Impoverished Counties of Central Party and Political Organs, Related Units and People’s Groups” (No. Guo Kai Fa [1994] 13), to specify Ministry of Health should aid Heishui County and Xiangtang County in Aba Prefecture, Sichuan. Over the past decade, the Ministry of Health, strictly in line with the general plan of the central party committee and the State Council as well as the unified requirements of LGOP, implemented “The State Seven-Year Priority Poverty Alleviation Program” and “China Rural Poverty Alleviation and Development Outline (2001-2010)”, combined the stress in health industry and the state’s requirements on poverty alleviation and development, put stress on the central areas, the west, rural areas, poverty-stricken areas and stricken areas in policies, planning and projects, etc, and accelerated the poverty alleviation breakthrough progress.

　　In 2009, the Ministry of Health coordinated related departments to support the rural health, public health, prevention and control of stressed diseases in the central and western areas, especially in key counties for national poverty alleviation and development. First, the Ministry of Health coordinated Ministry of Finance to provide special local health fund of 51.28 billion Yuan in the central financial, and more than 40% was spent on the development of the health industry in poor areas in the central and western areas. Second, the Ministry of Health coordinated National Development and Reform Commission to give priority to the construction projects in poverty-stricken areas in the improvement of basic-level medical & health service system construction, and a total of 5.17 billion Yuan was spent on the construction of people’s hospitals (TCM hospitals or Tibetan hospitals) in 306 impoverished counties. Third, put stress on poverty-stricken areas. 80% of the project investments in the west were subsidized by the central government, supporting investments were mostly provided by provincial governments, while the supporting investments of prefectures or below in Tibetan areas in Tibet and Qinghai, as well as the south of Xinjiang, were cancelled.

　　The party committee of Ministry of Health paid much attention to poverty alleviation, and set up Fixed-Point Poverty Alleviation Leading Group in charge of fixed-point poverty alleviation. Yin Dakui, the vice minister, Cao Ronggui, Wang Longde and Chen Xiaohong successively acted as the head of the group, leaders of related divisions /bureaus were the members, and the office of Fixed-Point Poverty Alleviation Leading Group is at Planning & Finance Division. The party committee confirmed that the poverty alleviation thoughts of the Ministry of Health should be: Exert industrial advantages, focus on poverty alleviation in health and reinforce the hardware construction of medical and health organizations in fixed-point poverty alleviation counties and health staff training.

　　【Poverty alleviation survey】  First, according to LGOP’s “Document on Improving the State’s Poverty Alleviation Strategy and Policy System, and the Survey on the Outline for the New Decade” (No. Guo Kai Ban Zu Han (2009) 37), the Ministry of Health participated in the survey in Zhejiang, Hubei, Chongqing and Sichuan initiated by the Ministry of Finance; second, in accordance with the supervision and inspection on the execution of special health funds, the Ministry of Health launched the poverty alleviation survey in health industry; third, in accordance with the central government’s planning and unified requirements, the Ministry of Health organized related staffs to carry out field survey in Tibet, Sichuan, Yunnan, Gansu and Qinghai, etc; fourth, according to the central government’s planning and unified requirements, to support the leapfrog development of culture, education and health industries in Xinjiang, the Ministry of Health, as the initiator, together with 11 departments, including National Development and Reform Commission, Ministry of Finance and Ministry of Education, etc, formed a culture, education and health survey team to go to Xinjiang for survey; fifth, the Ministry of Health participated in “Kaschin-Beck Disease Prevention Pilot Project in Guide County, Qinghai”; sixth, the Ministry of Health supported Bijie Experimental Zone in Guizhou, researched the working thoughts and measures to support the construction of Bijie Experimental Zone, participated in the special conferences organized respectively by United Front Work Department of CPC Central Committee and Chinese Peasants and Workers Democratic Party; seventh, the Ministry of Health went to carry out survey in Weining County, Guizhou, and researched the problems related to the fact that some farmers lived on selling blood.

　　【New rural cooperative medical system construction】  By the end of 2009, 2,716 counties (cities and districts) in the central and west regions launched the new rural cooperative medical services, the number of participants across China reached 833 million and 94.08% of the poor were involved.

　　【National basic public health service items】  In 2009, the central finance issued national basic public health service project funds of 10.4 billion Yuan, the public health service expense standard per capital should not be below 15 Yuan, stress was put on poverty-stricken areas and 3 provinces where there are lots of minorities, including Qinghai, Yunnan and Guizhou, and the proportion of subsidy was 80%, which was far above the standards of other areas.

　　【Maternal and child health projects】  In 2009, the central government invested 250 million Yuan to reduce the mortality rate of pregnant and lying-in women and to get rid of tetanus of neonates. All the poor rural areas in the central and western areas were covered by the project, the maternal and child health indices of areas covered by the project were improved year by year.

　　【Major disease prevention & control project】  In 2009, the Ministry of Health further improved the immune planning. While finishing conventional immune work, the Ministry of Finance, with funds of central government, provided supplementary hepatitis B vaccines for children below 15 and gave priority to impoverished areas. In 2009, the central government’s transferred payment project provided special TB funds of about 99.72 million Yuan for all national poor counties, and the funds were spent mainly on anti-TB drugs, patient management, supervision, diagnosis transfer tracing, special report and township sputum examination points; China’s TB control project funded with loans from the World Bank and donations from UK government covered 460 key counties for national poverty alleviation and development in 16 provinces, the total investments were about 25.62 million Yuan, which was mainly spent on equipments, civil engineering, drugs, technical support, execution study, health education and training, etc; the first round of China Global Fund TB Project covered 592 key counties for national poverty alleviation and development in 24 provinces, the total investments were about 19.48 million Yuan, which was spent mainly to reinforce DOTS, including patient finding, basic TB diagnosis equipments and office equipments provided for impoverished areas; the fourth round of China Global Fund TB Project covered 592 key counties for national poverty alleviation and development in 24 provinces, and the total investments were about 13.11 million Yuan, which was spent mainly to HR, health promotion and medical prevention cooperation, etc.

　　【Rural patriotic sanitation campaign】  In 2009, the central finance invested 784 million Yuan to support the harmless toilet construction in poor areas in the west. Among 95 already named national sanitary counties across China, 21 are key counties for national poverty alleviation and development, accounting for 22%. The sanitary environment of poverty-stricken areas has been improved.

　　【10000 Physicians’ Support to Rural Health Project】In 2009, 10,000 Physicians’ Support to Rural Health Project covered 592 key counties for national poverty alleviation and development, the investment was 65.12 million Yuan, accounting for 89% of the total investment, and the health talent team building of poor areas was improved.

　　【International cooperation projects in impoverished areas】  In 2009, Ministry of Health launched multilateral and bilateral cooperation, including Smile Train NSCLP Repairing Charity Project, China Gates AIDS Project, China Gates TB Project, China AIDS Project, China MSD AIDS Cooperation Project, China-Myanmar Border Malaria Project and China-Myanmar Border AIDS Project, altogether 321 impoverished counties were covered, and the health industry in impoverished areas was improved effectively.

　　【Poverty alleviation by temporary cadres】  In 2009, Ministry of Health selected Cao Jianping, the vice president of Parasitic Disease Prevention & Control Institute of China Center for Disease Control & Prevention, and Wang Maowu, head of Technology Development Office of China Center for Disease Control & Prevention, to work temporarily in Aba Prefecture, Sichuan, and they assisted the vice prefecture governor to coordinate health, population and birth control work.

　　(Poverty Alleviation Office, Ministry of Health)