ABSTRACT
China’s most recent set of health reforms have entered their sixth year of implementation in 2014. Between 2009 and 2013, the government expenditure on health reached RMB 3 trillion. More importantly, by the end of 2013, over 95% of Chinese citizens were covered by at least one social health insurance programme. Government health expenditure as a share of total health expenditure increased from 15.5% in 2000 to 30.1% in 2013.1
Although the universal coverage of social health insurance has been realized, affordability is still a concern. There has been double-digit annual growth in health expenditure in China for the past 10 years. Total health expenditure has reached RMB 3.16 trillion, which accounts for about 5.6% of gross domestic product (GDP) in 2013,2 compared to about 4% in 1997 (Figure 1). It is estimated the share of health expenditure in GDP will reach 8.4% by 2030 (Ma et al. 2012).
