Focus for now and years ahead is fixed on people's well-being: China Daily editorial

President Xi Jinping stressed the importance of giving priority to safeguarding people's health and building a high-quality and balanced basic public education service when he joined national political advisers from the education, medical and health sectors in a joint group meeting on Saturday.

Deepening educational reforms to build a more equitable and quality education system and making all-round efforts to build a healthy China were also set as key tasks for the government to improve the well-being of residents in the Government Work Report that Premier Li Keqiang delivered on Friday.

Everyone knows how challenging last year was given the heavy blow the COVID-19 pandemic dealt to the country. That top priority is being given to stabilize employment, ensure living standards and safeguard people's well-being shows that people-centered development is not just an idle ideal.

This is not only evident from the Government Work Report but also in the objectives of the 14th Five-Year Plan (2021-25), which aims to ensure that people's well-being reach a higher level.

The work report showed how the government is constantly shifting the focus of its work to meet people's needs for a better life.

To help people overcome the difficulties of the COVID-19 pandemic and stabilize employment, the government has cut taxes to help small and medium-sized enterprises survive the difficult times. And 6 million people received subsistence allowances or extreme poverty aid last year, and more than 8 million temporary grants were disbursed, as part of the government's efforts to extend timely assistance to those who were hit particularly hard by the pandemic.

Funds and human resources were also provided to the nation's poverty alleviation programs in 2020 so that all remaining rural villagers living in abject poverty, whose number totaled 5.51 million in early 2020, were lifted out of poverty.

Looking forward, the work report promises that the government will develop a general support mechanism to cover outpatient medical bills, and take general steps toward reimbursing outpatient bills through unified accounts.

It will also develop more diversified community services, including elderly care, child care, dining services, cleaning services and build more support facilities.

And the report says that the government will increase the supply of government-subsidized rental housing and shared-ownership housing, and make every effort to address the housing difficulties faced by people, especially new urban residents and young people.

What has been done and what is to be done show that the well-being of residents is always the foremost priority.