ABSTRACT
This chapter focuses on two approaches adopted by the state in reducing and redirecting demand for public medicine: the safety-net approach and the shared care approach. The ‘public assistance’ approach is deemed inappropriate in the sense that highly subsidised service is in actual practice provided for all as long as the patients are willing to consume public medicine. The Scott Report suggests that even if no improvements are made to existing services, the proportion of the total government budget devoted to public medicine will increase steadily, unless the resources deployed are utilised more efficiently and additional revenue is raised by the introduction of higher charges. The 1993 Medical Green Paper points out that there has been significant real increase in the incomes of the families in Hong Kong, while there has been no real increase in health care charges for many years.
