Support for barefoot doctors urged

BEIJING - Chinese political advisors on Saturday called for more support for barefoot doctors serving the country's vast rural areas.

The government should have relevant policies to train those barefoot doctors and help them to obtain necessary qualifications, as well as ensure their livelihood in pension and health care, so they can provide better medical services to the people in rural areas, said Li Liming, a member of the Chinese People's Political Consultative Conference National Committee.

Barefoot doctors are farmers who receive minimal medical and paramedical training and work in rural villages to offer basic medical services. They have become part of the major grassroots health care system in China, and have been introduced to other developing countries by the World Health Organization, according to Li, who is also the executive president of the Chinese Academy of Medical Sciences.

"We are now facing a big problem -- they don't have doctor's qualifications, although villagers are pretty confident in those 1 million barefoot doctors," Li said in a press conference on health reforms.

"The health reform should provide the most basic medical services in local communities, so we need to pay more attention to barefoot doctors," Li added.

Chen Zhongqiang, another political advisor and president of Peking University Third Hospital, said he delivered a proposal concerning the county and township medical service system, adding that the new rural cooperative medical care system can run effectively only with adequate clinics and doctors in rural areas.

More than 95 percent of China's population have been covered by the health care system for urban citizens and the new rural cooperative medical care system.

Chen said the field study found that there are no educational background requirements for doctors in the villages, but there are such requirements for veterinarians.

Chen added that the government needs to support barefoot doctors in other fields, including offering continued education, raising their incomes and addressing their livelihood after they retire.