National Health Commission: Further Improve Rural Doctors' Pension Benefits

Recently, the official website of the National Health Commission released the Reply to the No. 2839 Proposal of the Fifth Session of the 13th National People's Congress. In response to the proposal of requesting the state to issue policies as soon as possible to solve the problem of elderly rural barefoot doctors, the National Health Commission replied as follows:

Work Status and Progress Status

Rural doctors are the health "guardians" closest to hundreds of millions of rural residents, and an important force in developing rural medical and health services and ensuring the health of rural residents. The CPC Central Committee and The State Council attach great importance to the construction of rural doctors.

In 2015, The General Office of the State Council issued the Implementation Opinions on Further Strengthening the Construction of the Team of Rural Doctors (hereinafter referred to as the Implementation Opinions), which stipulated the function orientation, education and training, income treatment, pension and exit mechanism of rural doctors.

The Law on the Promotion of Basic Medical and Health Care, which came into effect in June 2020, stipulates that the state will strengthen the construction of rural medical and health personnel, improve the mechanism of multi-channel subsidies to rural medical and health personnel for their service income and the old-age care policy, providing legal guarantee for the construction of rural medical and health personnel.

In recent years, the National Health Commission has guided all localities to strengthen the training and construction of rural health personnel through various means, and the quality and capability of the personnel have been significantly improved. By the end of 2021, China had 1.147 million village doctors, 476,000 of whom were licensed (assistant) physicians.

Replies to the suggestions made

The old-age security problem is one of the most strongly expressed problems by village doctors. According to the guidelines, all localities should support and guide qualified rural doctors to participate in the basic old-age insurance for employees. Rural doctors who are not covered by the basic old-age insurance for employees can participate in the basic old-age insurance for urban and rural residents in their native places. For rural doctors who have reached the age of 60, local governments should take various forms such as subsidies in light of actual conditions to further improve the old-age benefits for rural doctors.

Persons who have had the formal establishment of township health centers before quitting shall participate in the old-age insurance of government organs and public institutions according to relevant regulations; The extras employed for township health centers before quitting should participate in the basic old-age insurance for enterprise employees according to law; Rural doctors outside the above scope can voluntarily participate in the basic old-age insurance for enterprise employees or urban and rural residents as flexible workers according to local regulations. Some qualified local governments have introduced relevant policies to subsidize rural doctors' participation in the insurance.

At present, Tianjin, Shanghai, Jiangsu, Zhejiang, Fujian, Gansu and other places have included rural doctors in the old-age insurance of urban workers, which has solved the old-age insurance problem of rural doctors from the system. Hebei, Shandong and other provinces provide certain government subsidies for rural doctors to participate in the old-age insurance for urban and rural residents.

For the elderly rural doctors who leave their posts, most places adopt the quota subsidy or the seniority subsidy according to the years of service to improve the pension treatment. Guangxi, Hainan, Ningxia and other places according to the standard of 15 to 20 yuan per month for one year of work to provide annual subsidy; Guangdong gives a quota subsidy of 700 to 900 yuan per person per month. In Anhui, Jiangxi, Henan, Qinghai and other places, village doctors who have been working in village clinics for more than 10 years are provided with pension subsidies of no less than 300 yuan per person per month.

In addition, the country has introduced measures for poor groups, including poor elderly rural doctors.

1. The Opinions of The State Council on the Establishment of a Unified Basic Endowment Insurance System for Urban and Rural Residents in 2014 clearly states that those who have reached the age of 60 when the basic endowment insurance system is established and have not received the basic old-age security benefits stipulated by the State do not have to pay fees, but can receive the basic old-age insurance pension for urban and rural residents on a monthly basis.

2. In 2020, the CPC Central Committee and The State Council issued Opinions on Effectively Connecting the Achievements of Poverty Alleviation and Rural Revitalization, clarifying that local governments should pay part or all of the premiums for the subsistence allowance recipients of the endowment insurance for urban and rural residents, the extremely poor, the people returning to poverty, the severely disabled and other groups with difficulty in paying the premiums according to the lowest level in light of the actual local conditions. When raising the level of old-age insurance contributions for urban and rural residents, the current minimum level of contributions will be maintained for the above-mentioned disadvantaged groups and other people who have been lifted out of poverty.

Next work objectives and plans

The National Health Commission will continue to actively coordinate with relevant departments to strengthen policy and financial support for the construction of rural doctors, and further improve their old-age benefits. We will guide all local governments to fulfill their responsibility for ensuring local government investment, solve social security problems of village doctors and elderly care by classification, and maintain the stability of village doctors and promote their optimal development. Compacting local responsibilities, on the basis of the implementation of existing policies and measures, further strive for policy breakthrough and innovation, to solve the problem of rural doctors for the elderly.