US President Barack Obama has fulfilled one key promise of his election campaign - affordable healthcare for the uninsured.
Healthcare issues have long troubled the superpower - even today 46 million of its citizens, or more than one eighths of its population, are out of its health insurance ambit.
China too is beset by some of the problems faced by the US healthcare system, such as high costs, low efficiency, and lack of justice in implementation.
China too is carrying out a healthcare reform plan. I think we should learn from Obama's reforms to improve on our own.
The first and most essential principle governing healthcare reform is how to better promote justice in the current market economy.
Since it is a kind of social security, healthcare insurance should not be solely market-oriented. If market players dominate, their pursuit of profits would inevitably undermine the foundations of justice.
In the past few years, the US healthcare reform plan was opposed by such interest groups as insurance corporations and the wealthy.
Healthcare reform in China should stick to the principle of justice so that ordinary citizens, not only large corporations, can benefit from the reform.
The Chinese society has, in fact, shown us the way to do this - by avoiding such deficiencies as the "tyranny of the majority" our administrations tend to be more firm and efficient in protecting the rights of disadvantaged groups and promoting social justice.
Another important aspect is the role played by the government in the process.
By propelling the healthcare reform, the Obama administration evidently hurt the interests of several groups - commercial insurance companies, some senior citizens, and the wealthy, who all felt their interests were being violated.
All these various groups united politically to roundly oppose the plan.
According to the US healthcare act, the government will intervene in commercial insurance plans with measures including maximum limit to the cost of the insured so that the patients would no longer have to worry about falling into bankruptcy. Besides, in order to stimulate competition and lower insurance costs, public health insurance branches are also to be established.
Since it is free from such opposing interest groups, the government in China is expected to be more active in taking measures that benefit the common people.
Of course, a perfect plan is far from enough; and that brings us to the third point, namely feasibility and implementation of the reform plans.
The difficulties Obama met in selling his reform plans to the US Congress have not only attracted widespread attention, but also demonstrated his determination in implementing them.
After repeated disputes and constant editing, the reform plan was presented to the public with almost every detail being considered, like the fund raising sources, cost computation modes etc. The rights and responsibilities of citizens and government branches concerned were exactly defined, thus granting legal solutions to almost every possible problem.
Lack of a detailed plan (in China) has caused many problems, as many related government branches are not clear about their responsibilities. This has seriously lowered people's confidence in the reform plan, and China should attach more importance to this respect.
Lastly, let's not forget some essential elements needed in the reform, such as transparency, efficiency and publicity. In the US, the public always discussed the healthcare reform, so the measure garnered both trust and confidence from the public. Healthcare reform in China should also be more transparent. Only by granting everybody the opportunity to speak on his own behalf can it serve the interest of as many people as possible.
The healthcare system is directly related to the basic rights of every member in modern society. Individual citizens and corporations have adverse interests in a healthcare system, so the government needs to coordinate and intervene in this complicated relationship.
It is still too early to predict the success of the US healthcare reform, but as a giant nation sharing the same kind of problems, we should do our job as well.
The author is a research fellow at the School of International Relations and Diplomacy, Beijing Foreign Studies University.
(China Daily 05/10/2010 page8)