Corporate and Foundation Relations

THE CHINA INITIATIVE
INTERNATIONAL PARTNERSHIPS IN PUBLIC HEALTH

“The rise of China, in my view, is the economic and geopolitical event of our age.”
— Hon. Robert F. Ellsworth, former commissioner of the U.S.-China Economic and Security Review Commission and U.S. ambassador to NATO

CHINA: ENORMOUS STRIDES, SIGNIFICANT CHALLENGES

Why Harvard?
Mission
Collaborations in China
The Program
Partners
News


	A rural health clinic. Photo by Richard Feldman/HSPH.

China in the last quarter-century has made enormous strides in improving the health and wealth of its people, lifting hundreds of millions out of poverty and introducing significant improvements in housing, education, and health care. Tremendous opportunities exist in this country of 1.3 billion. But serious challenges remain:

• Rural China, home to about two-thirds of the population, lacks the public health and educational infrastructure to provide reliable, affordable services.

• As millions move to the cities in search of jobs, they face environmental and workplace exposures that threaten health. In many urban centers, the by-products of manufacturing have compromised air and water quality.

• Ninety percent of rural Chinese are uninsured. Even in the cities, many have limited access to health insurance, and are too poor to pay for medical care or drugs. A single illness can bankrupt families living on the margins.

• Diseases of modernization—including obesity, heart disease, and cancer—are on the rise as many Chinese adopt sedentary lifestyles and Westernized diets, and smoking is increasing at an alarming rate.

• New infectious diseases such as bird flu and SARS had their genesis in Asia. In a world made ever smaller by globalization, emerging pathogens threaten the lives and economies of China and countries around the world.

• AIDS, tuberculosis, and other well known foes spread quickly in the absence of adequate public health measures.

In 2004, the Chinese economy grew by 9.5 percent. 1

Chinese government and university officials at the Ministry of Health, the Central Party School, Tsinghua University, and other institutions are collaborating with the Harvard School of Public Health to ensure China’s continued progress by addressing these and other threats to the health of the Chinese people. The goal of the new China Initiative is to train policymakers, academic scholars, and practitioners so that China can respond more rapidly and effectively to its most pressing public health challenges.

90 percent of China’s 800 million
rural residents are uninsured. 2

WHY HARVARD?


	Chinese Minister of Health Gao Qiang (first row, fifth from left) and HSPH Dean Barry R. Bloom (first row, fourth from left) at the partnership signing ceremony. Photo by Richard Feldman/HSPH. click for larger image

The Harvard School of Public Health has deep, sustaining roots in China. For over two decades, the School has collaborated with Chinese government agencies and academic institutions to establish research and training programs. These include the largest prospective study to date of the health of Chinese textile workers, a program in HIV/AIDS diagnosis and treatment to prepare health specialists to lead the fight against the disease, and a seven-year study on China’s rural health-care financing that helped shape the country’s new rural-health policy.

An estimated 840,000 Chinese are now living with HIV/AIDS, but that number is projected to rise to 10 million by 2010. 4

COLLABORATIONS IN CHINA INCLUDE:


	Central Party School Vice President Yu Yunyao and HSPH Dean Barry R. Bloom. Photo by Richard Feldman/HSPH.

• Developing insurance health safety nets and community-based health financing strategies for the rural poor

• Evaluating health care reforms

• Conducting AIDS medical-training courses and AIDS-research workshops

• Surveying families to assess equity and disparities in the health system

• Estimating the economic burden of smoking on families

• Investigating the role genes play in obesity, diabetes, heart disease, and hypertension

• Studying the health costs of aging

• Assessing nongovernmental organizations’ contributions to health care

• Assessing human exposures to power-plant emissions

• Analyzing dietary contributions to childhood obesity

• Training outstanding Chinese students at HSPH and Harvard Medical School to become future health leaders

If present smoking patterns continue, about 100 million of the 300 million Chinese males now age 0–29 will eventually be killed by tobacco. 5

THE PROGRAM

The China Initiative comprises three parts:

• A five-year training program for China’s senior health care leaders and executives.

• Annual forums on health and social development to stimulate academic exchange and policy discussions.

• Occupational health studies to identify and remedy health and safety hazards in the workplace. Intense and ongoing interaction between HSPH faculty and Chinese health leaders is a hallmark of the China Initiative.

583 million of China's 1.3 billion people live on less than $2 a day 3

PARTNERS FOR THIS INITIATIVE INCLUDE:

• The Chinese Ministry of Health

• The Central Party School, C.P.C.

• Tsinghua University

• The Chinese Centers for Disease Control and Prevention

• Global companies

More than 114 million migrant workers have left farms for the cities, a number expected to reach 300 million by 2020. 3

NOTES
1. New York Times, January 26, 2005
2. Liu Y. “The development of China’s rural health insurance,” Health Policy and Planning 2004; 19 (3): 159-165
3. New York Times, September 12, 2004
4. Joint UN Program on HIV/AIDS
5. Nature Medicine, Vol. 5, No.1, January 1999

Photos: Richard Feldman