The Ministry of Human Resources and Social Security announced recently that a study on human resources management is underway to cut the number of officially funded posts at China’s vast number of public institutions including universities and hospitals.
In a pilot program, some hospitals in the city of Shenzhen, southern China’s Guangdong Province, have seen the number of posts that received official funding slashed, following the model of the University of Hong Kong (Shenzhen) Hospital, according to a report by China News Service.
Unlike other hospitals that rely heavily on financial investment from the government, these hospitals are already self-financing and are responsible for their own profits and loss. The Shenzhen government has announced that all government funded posts at newly-established hospitals in the city will be abolished.
Li Chuang, director of the medical reform office at the Health and Family Planning Commission of Shenzhen, said reducing the number of such posts and shrinking bureaucracy is an important step in medical reform, but it will take time to see if this can break new ground in China’s often-troubled hospitals.
“The fundamentals of China’s medical reform lie in transforming the role of the government. China’s health sector management should be based on the market economy and the rule of law in a bid to establish a high-quality and people-oriented medical service system,” he said.
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