ABSTRACT
The health of China’s population is important not only in terms of the government’s commitment to its people’s well-being but also to the ability of the people to enhance economic development. The Kuomintang government founded a national health administration in the late 1920s, and health programs were an important part of the government’s plans for rural reconstruction. Government efforts to make hospitals more self-reliant caused healthcare costs to rise by 20 percent and more each year from the 1990s onward, far in excess of the increase in gross domestic product. The enormous nature of the task involved and the decreasing ability of the central government to exact compliance from its subordinate units and from the citizenry at large make it doubtful that these quality-of-life problems can be solved easily or soon. Party and government leaders are cognizant of the intricately intertwined issues of health, demography, the environment, and economic growth.
