China’s National Health and Family Planning Commission and State Council have been working to reform the health care sector. Some ways in which officials are tackling health care reform include addressing drug sales in hospitals, reducing price controls on drugs, promoting the growth of private hospitals, and improving the quality of health care staff.

The State Council laid out health care reform objectives in a May 9 Circular, including the objective to eliminate drug markups as well as plans to make medical services of public hospitals more affordable and improve the quality of the staff. Implementation of performance assessments in hospitals is to help ensure that medical staff who do a better job will be paid accordingly.