A different take on healthcare

China was fourth from the bottom on the 2006 list of World Health Organization member countries in terms of granting its citizens equal access to and financing healthcare. This is a telling statement on a country that is on way to becoming the world's second largest economy.

Healthcare reform is stuck in a quagmire. Many experts have come up with suggestions for healthcare reform. But Li Dun's ideas are different from the current reformers. The sociologist with the Center for the Study of Contemporary China in Tsinghua University says the government is trying to cure the symptoms instead of the disease inflicting the healthcare system.

"As the report of the 17th National Congress of the Communist Party of China says, there should be all-round reform. I emphasize that the reform focus at the institutional level," says Li, who has been part of the healthcare policymaking process for a long time. Li supposes the direction of healthcare reform reflects the authorities' governing philosophy: whether it is for the people and whether it would achieve social harmony.