China to extend cooperative medical insurance program to more rural areas

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Source: CCTV.com | 09-05-2007 15:03

Full video: "Progress of new cooperative medical scheme" Part(I)(II)(III)

China's Health Ministry has urged to strengthen supervision over the Rural Cooperative Medical program. It says 2007 is a crucial year to advance the program from the experimental stage to full implementation.

Chinese Health Minister Chen Zhu says that the Rural Cooperative Medical Scheme, or RCM, has worked smoothly over the past years, and has made considerable achievements. He says the central government has decided to extend the program to more areas.

Chen Zhu said, "The RCM program is going to cover over 80% of rural areas by the end of 2007. And by the end of next year, all the rural areas should be covered."

Among the 1.3 billion people in China, two thirds live in rural areas. For many of them, going to the hospital is a luxury. To address this problem, the central government launched a rural cooperative medical care program in 2003.

Under the program, each person pays 10 yuan annually into a fund to which the government adds a larger amount. When a person goes to the hospital, they pay a part of the medical fees, with the other part being covered by the fund.

However, some of the farmers are reluctant to join the program because of a lack of confidence in the fund system. Referring to this problem, Chen says the central government is strengthening supervision to ensure that medical re-disbursement money is deposited into the farmers' account in time.

Chen Zhu said, "This money is used to save the farmers' lives, thus no department or individual is allowed to use it. Now we not only have the government supervising the program, we've also set up a mechanism to allow society, and the farmer representatives keeping an eye on it."

Over the past four years, the central government has been strengthening its efforts in the program. This year, it added money to the budgetary funds, now totaling nearly 1 billion yuan. Up to now, over 400 million rural people have benefited from the scheme.

The improvement of the quality of life of farmers has always been a top priority for the central government. The Cooperative Medical Scheme has been used for four years and it is helping an increasing number of rural people. Though farmers still have to pay a certain percent of their medical costs, it is already a big step from no help at all.

Editor:Du Xiaodan