Medical industry experts discuss opportunities created by COVID-19

Despite the challenges created, the COVID-19 pandemic has presented many opportunities for the health sector as the public is now more concerned about their health than ever before, health industry insiders said at a summit held by CEC Capital in Shanghai on Thursday.

Chen Qiyu, co-president of Fosun International, said that before 2020, only about 4 percent of the Chinese population seek influenza vaccinations in China each year, a stark contrast compared to developed nations where the rate is about 30 percent.

"But it is expected that people, especially the elderly, will now be more willing to be vaccinated because of this pandemic," said Chen.

Liang Wannian, executive vice-dean of the Wanke School of Public Health, Tsinghua University, said that the pandemic has prompted an upgrade of the public health system and stimulated rapid improvement in the country's capabilities in biomedicine development, vaccine research and mass testing.

"The rapid and powerful response to the pandemic will also help improve the country's comprehensive capability in the diagnosis and treatment of acute respiratory diseases, emergency handling of epidemics, and help establish a more complete emergency rescue system and drug ecosystem," said Liang.

Li Jiaqiang, a tenured professor of medicine at Harvard University, said he believes that public acceptance of some novel trends in the medical industry will be accelerated because of the crisis.

"For example, remote medical treatment was sought after by more than 100,000 individuals in the United States each year before 2020. The number of those turning to such treatment in the past year has already reached 18 million," said Li, who also expects that investment from both governments and businesses in the health sector will continue to increase after the pandemic.

Zhang Lianshan, president of global research and development at Hengrui Medicine Co Ltd, said that various COVID-19 vaccines have made impressive progress in the past months and will play a significant role in disease prevention.

"But the medical industry should continue to search for small- and macro-molecules that have the potential to be developed into therapies that can effectively treat the novel coronavirus pneumonia and its complications," he said.