ABSTRACT
Any picture of how the health care system develops and which direction health care reforms are heading towards in Hong Kong has to begin with a theoretical framework that can highlight the major elements or features shaping and reshaping health care policy. Between 1945 and 1950, state intervention in health care was minimal. Realising that immigrants were going to settle in the Colony, the state began to initiate planning for health care development in 1957, which finally led to the publication of the first Medical White Paper in 1964. The complex relationship between formal and informal care has been well recognised especially in the study of the care of older people. The study of alternative medicine and the response of the medical profession towards it has also begun to develop. The chapter also presents some closing thoughts on the key concepts discussed in the preceding chapters of this book.
