China is advancing its healthcare system through the Healthy China Initiative, a comprehensive plan aimed at expanding access to affordable healthcare nationwide. The initiative focuses on strengthening rural medical facilities, improving health insurance coverage, and making quality medical services more accessible to the country’s population of over 1.4 billion people.
President Xi Jinping has underscored the importance of directing more medical resources to community-level institutions, ensuring that essential healthcare services reach both urban and rural areas. During a visit to a township clinic in Jiangsu province in 2014, Xi called for improvements to local medical facilities and efforts to reduce the challenges and costs associated with obtaining treatment.
Reforms under the initiative encompass hospital management, medical insurance, medicine supplies, healthcare supervision, and tiered medical services. These measures are designed to enable serious illnesses to be treated within provinces, common conditions within cities or counties, and routine health issues at local medical facilities. The development of 125 national regional medical centers, particularly in central and western regions, supports this strategy, with over 90 percent of residents able to access nearby medical services within 15 minutes.
Preventive healthcare is also being strengthened, with particular attention to children and older people. Initiatives to reduce childhood myopia have led to a decline in the student myopia rate over five years, reaching 49.9 percent in 2025, a decrease of 3.7 percentage points since 2018. The average life expectancy in China rose to 79.25 years in 2025, accompanied by progress in controlling major infectious and endemic diseases and a reduction in the premature mortality rate from major chronic diseases to 13.8 percent.
Medical technology and pharmaceutical innovation are increasingly central to China’s healthcare strategy, as the government encourages the development and application of digital healthcare, artificial intelligence, and domestic medicines and medical equipment. By the first half of 2026, 38 innovative drugs had been approved in China.
Traditional Chinese medicine remains a vital part of the healthcare framework, with efforts to modernize and promote international cooperation through overseas medical teams and traditional medicine centers. China aims to align its healthcare system with broader modernization goals by 2035, as it faces the ongoing challenge of enhancing service quality, affordability, and access amid an aging population and diverse healthcare needs.