New Publication: Long-term care in China (The Lancet)

In China, the population is rapidly ageing and the capacity of the system that cares for older people is increasingly a concern. In this Review, we provide a profile of the long-term care system and policy landscape in China. The long-term care system is characterised by rapid growth of the residential care sector, slow development of home and community-based services, and increasing involvement of the private sector. The long-term care workforce shortage and weak quality assurance are concerning. Public long-term care financing is minimal and largely limited to supporting welfare recipients and subsidising the construction of residential care beds and operating costs. China is piloting social insurance long-term care financing models and, concurrently, programmes for integrating health care and long-term care services in selected settings across the country; the effectiveness and sustainability of these pilots remain to be seen. Informed by international long-term care experiences, we offer policy recommendations to strengthen the evolving care system for older people in China.

Feng, Zhanlian, Elena Glinskaya, Hongtu Chen, Sen Gong, Yue Qiu, Jianming Xu, and Winnie Yip. 2020. Long-term care system for older adults in China: policy landscape, challenges, and future prospects. The Lancet 396: 1362–1372. doi: 10.1016/S0140-6736(20)32136-X.

Resources

  • A list of our other English-language publications is available here.
  • A list of our Chinese-language publications is available here.

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