Inequities in the allocation of medical resources in China’s Township Health Centers

Yue Ma, Linxiu Zhang and Matthew Boswell

China Agricultural Economic Review, 2016, vol. 8, issue 4, 637-646

Abstract: Purpose - The purpose of this paper is to produce a high-quality measure of the nature of healthcare resources available in China’s Township Health Centers (THCs), paying particular attention to equity between high- and low-income areas. Design/methodology/approach - This study makes use of data from a nearly nationally representative survey in rural China conducted by the Center for Chinese Agricultural Policy at the Chinese Academy of Sciences in 2011. The samples of towns were selected randomly from 25 counties located in five provinces from different regions of China. Data were collected through questionnaires and direct observation. Findings - The THCs located in rich areas have higher levels of human resources than poor areas. THCs in rich areas also have more fixed assets than those in poor areas. In fact, even though the Chinese Ministry of Health mandates that all THCs have certain basic levels of medical equipment and facilities, many THCs in poor areas do not have them. The allocation of mandated equipment is unequal. Practical implications - These findings suggest that China’s government should pay more attention to THCs located in poor areas, especially in light of new initiatives to improve health care in poor rural areas. Originality/value - This is the first nationally representative study to employ rigorous empirics to investigate the extent of inequality in allocation of resources within THCs across China.

Keywords: China; Health; Inequality; Rural development; Medical resources; Township health centers (search for similar items in EconPapers)
Date: 2016
References: Add references at CitEc
Citations: View citations in EconPapers (1)

Downloads: (external link)
https://www.emerald.com/insight/content/doi/10.110 ... d&utm_campaign=repec (text/html)
https://www.emerald.com/insight/content/doi/10.110 ... d&utm_campaign=repec (application/pdf)
Access to full text is restricted to subscribers

Related works:
This item may be available elsewhere in EconPapers: Search for items with the same title.

Export reference: BibTeX RIS (EndNote, ProCite, RefMan) HTML/Text

Persistent link: https://EconPapers.repec.org/RePEc:eme:caerpp:caer-11-2015-0170

DOI: 10.1108/CAER-11-2015-0170

Access Statistics for this article

China Agricultural Economic Review is currently edited by Dr Fu Qin, Dr Jikun Huang, Dr Kevin Z Chen, Dr Weiming Tian, Prof Daniel Sumner, Prof Xian Xin and Prof Holly Wang

More articles in China Agricultural Economic Review from Emerald Group Publishing Limited
Bibliographic data for series maintained by Emerald Support ().