Chindia Lounge

VioletStar November 10th, 2006

Not until recently, most people in the west will consider “Chindia” – India and China, to be developing world. The images of the countries in their mind are people wearing shabby clothes, living in dirty and crowded environment, orphans and cheap labor. In the past two years, the two countries are more described as emerging economies, future powerhouse or outsourcing paradise. In fact the “developing” and “emerging” worlds co-exist in Chindia. The difference in healthcare development in various regions of India and China reveals part of the story.

India

In rural areas of India, shortages of trained medical, personnel, equipment, consumables and facilities remain, despite the government’s efforts to improve the healthcare situation. The health status of the urban poor is said to be as bad as those living in rural areas. However healthcare standards in the urban area is increasing, infrastructure is also developing.

The indian government has introduced new health insurance initiatives which benefit the middle class. About 500,000 people now have access to quality medical facilities. However, these mainly covered the urban area where most of the private sector invested. Due to India’s vast rural population, only one third of population have access to healthcare. Around 65% of hospitals and 85% of hospital beds are in urban areas. It is expected that the situation will gradually improve in the next decade.

China

Healthcare services in rural areas are very poor due to government ignorance and hospital autonomy. Cities with significant political importance such as Bejing or economic growth such as Shanghai and Guangzhou get thefocus from the Chinese government on healthcare development. Medical insurance system is urban focused. In areas where medical insurance is less common such as Guangzhou, individuals often pay out of pocket for their healthcare services. The government has plan to reform the medical insurance system to cover more people and with that co-pay system will be further introduced.

Most Chinese also prefer traditional Chinese Remedies to western remedies. In practice, a lot of Chinese only take Western medicines in the treatment of acute diseases or serious medical conditions. However, more Chinese are now combining Chinese and Western therapies in cardiovascular, oncology and respiratory diseases. Chinese government also has plans to support development of both traditional chinese medicine and western medicine in the country.

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VioletStar November 9th, 2006

Hong Kong’s former director of health Margaret Chan was nominated World Health Organisation director-general. I had the chance to work closely with her department when I worked in the Pharmaceutial Industry in Hong Kong. Dr Chan sometimes spoke in the functions organised by Hong Kong Association of Pharmceutical Industry (HKAPI). During this WHO election, she saw her lead all the way in four rounds of voting and was granted 70% of votes and had beaten representatives from Mexico, Japan and other countries. Dr. Chan was well known internationally for her handling of bird flu outbreak in Hong Kong in 1999 by killing millions of poultry. She will start her new position from Jan 2007. Her victory was generally considered to be the results of vigorous lobby from Chinese government. This is the highest position for any Chinese to serve in United Nation organizations. It is considered to be an important milestone both within and outside of China.

After two decades of working closely with WHO, Dr Chan joined the organization as Director of the Department of Protection of the Human Environment in 2003. In June 2005, she became Assistant Director-General for the Communicable Diseases cluster of departments and took up the newly-created post of Representative of the Director-General for Pandemic Influenza.

Dr. Chan is the second Asian that has got senior position with United Nations or International Organization recently. South Korean Foreign Minister, Ban Ki-Moon, 62, was earlier nominated to succeed Kofi Annan to become U.N. Secretary-General. It is expected that influence of Asia on international affairs will continue to escalate in the next 5-10 year.

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VioletStar November 7th, 2006

Swiss pharmaceutical company Novartis plans to invest INR5 billion over next five years to set up a research and development facility near the southern Indian city of Hyderabad, the Financial Express reported quoting unnamed government sources. Novartis has sought a 60-hectare site to set up the research facility. The company also plans to set up information technology backup operations along with its research facility, the report said.

Novartis is also building up R&D activities in China with the planned investment of up to $100 million over the next few years in facilities which will focus on cancers related to infectious diseases endemic in Asia.

A 5,000sq m pilot facility on a site in Shanghai’s Zhangjiang Hi-Tech Park is due to begin operations next May, and the construction of a permanent 37,000sq m building for around 400 researchers, mostly recruited locally, will start in July.

Novartis’s chairman and CEO, Dr Daniel Vasella, hinted around a year ago that a new R&D facility in China was being considered and said that scientific expertise in the country was now “rising rapidly”. The aim is to combine modern western and traditional Chinese approaches to medicine research, which it is hoped will also yield diagnostic tools such as biomarkers and gene expression profiling which can be used in the firm’s global research programmes.

The early focus of activity would be on common Asian disorders such as liver cancer due to hepatitis. The B virus affects around 130 million people in mainland China alone, causing an estimated 300,000 deaths annually, it noted.

Other firms upping their investment in China recently include AstraZeneca, which said in May that it had set aside $100 million for a new R&D centre to start operations by the end of 2009, also focusing on cancer. GlaxoSmithKline is also considering expanding its Chinese R&D activities, but the Novartis facility appears to be concentrating on more advanced technology than some of the other multinational programmes in China.

The firm opened an institute for tropical diseases in Singapore several years ago, concentrating on neglected diseases such as dengue fever and tuberculosis.

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VioletStar September 17th, 2006

I was listening to National Public Radio the other day and they talked about overseas surgeries sponsored by employers. In particular, apart from providing data management, customer call centre service, hospitals in India are now targeting western patients in providing healthcare service.

A lot of India doctors received education and practiced medicine in US and went back to India. These doctors now practiced in big and accredited hospitals and provided 5-star service with only a fraction of cost in the US. Americans may go overseas and get health care for about 80 percent less than in the U.S., and actually may get better care in nicer hospitals overseas. There are also much higher ration of registered nurses to patients. In addition these healthcare packages also provide tour to the beach or other exotic locations.

One of the companies offering overseas surgery packages is Florida-based United Group Programs. It’s been administering employer health insurance plans for 39 years. And it’s been looking for a good way to slow the rise in health-care spending for just about as long.

Almost all the hospitals Americans would consider for a program like this are hospitals that have so-called Joint Commission International accreditation, which is the international affiliate of the very same quality accreditation organization that Medicare uses.

They could still be a lot of barriers before offshore healthcare could become popular. There are a lot of negativitiy about companies encourging employees to receive overseas healthcare. Some labor unions have objected the concept as they think this may encourage companies to make it a mandatory practice. There may also concerns about handling mismanagement of procedures etc.

Having said that, more options should be considered by individual, companies and governement to deal with the ever rising healthcare cost. More importantly we should have the rights to pick the best quality and affordable healthcare service for ourselves.

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