Zhang Wenkang, as Minister of Health, oversaw the reform of the health care system. Instead of government-supported free medical care, enterprises must now provide medical insurance for employees, and hospitals may earn profits.

Zhang tackled the deficiency and poor distribution of medical resources, which are currently concentrated in large urban hospitals while rural areas have little access to health care and small urban hospitals are underutilized. Zhang promoted community health centers staffed with general practitioners to prevent disease resulting from unhealthy lifestyles, to follow up treatment of chronic, non-infectious diseases (which are on the rise given the control of infectious diseases and the ageing of the population), and to treat minor ailments. Such services, while not covered by insurance, are much cheaper at community health centers than at hospitals, and thus help cut the rapid growth of medical expenses and achieve Zhang’s goal of "health care for all" by 2000.

Zhang has also decreed that hospitals turn over to administrative department the profits from the sale of medicine, which made up 50 percent of their revenue and led to the practice of over-prescribing. To compensate, hospitals are being allowed to increase their fees for consultations and treatment. Hospitals that offer high quality and efficient service will have the profits returned to them. As people are given greater freedom to choose hospitals, competition among hospitals will eliminate the weaker institutions.

To improve health care in rural areas, Zhang promoted the development of traditional Chinese medicine. He has also introduced measures to curb medical malpractice. To prevent the outbreak of epidemics in the wake of the disastrous floods of 1998, Zhang helped launch a public awareness campaign, and deployed high tech epidemic surveillance. Zhang also dealt with the spread of AIDS through public education and treatment of STDs, and hoped to handle the high suicide rate of Chinese women through a national plan for suicide intervention and making antidepressants more widely available.
 

1940 - Born in Shanghai

1962 - Graduated from Medical Treatment Department of Shanghai First Medical College.

1962-1990 - Served consecutively as lecturer, Chief of the Diving Physiology Office, Associate Professor, Vice President and Director of the Training Department at  the PLA Second Medical University

1966 - Joined the Chinese Communist Party (CCP).

1988 - Awarded "major general."

1990 to 1993 - Trained in medicine, Zhang was Deputy Director of the Health Department of the PLA General Logistics Department.

1993 - Became director of the State Traditional Chinese Medicine Administration and Vice Minister of Health.

1994 - Become Chairman of the Chinese Commission of Certification of Medicine and Chemical Reagents.

1995 -  Awarded honorary Chairmanship of the Council of China Pharmaceutical University. He was also President of the Chinese Medical Association.

1997 - Elected a member of the Fifteenth CCP Central Committee, China’s top leadership

1998 - Appointed Minister of Health.

20 April 2003 - Removed from his post as Minister of Health because of the MOH's poor response to the SARS crisis.

UPDATED: 12 August 2003

http://www.chinaonline.com/refer/biographies/secure/BB-REV-ZhangWenkang3.asp