Real benefits

It is true that the new system can ease farmers' burdens in their medical treatments. However, the system did encounter its challenges at first. The greatest difficulty was how to persuade farmers in Ganyu County's 436 administrative villages in 18 towns to sign up.

"When we explained the new medical system to farmers, many of them hesitated to pay the membership fee, because they could not see the benefit they could get from the system," Wang Jingyuan, former Director of Health Bureau of Ganyu who was in charge of developing the new medical system, told China Economic Weekly.

To solve the problem, Wang conducted an in-depth investigation and found that those who had benefited from the system were likely to continue their membership as they had seen tangible benefits.

Based on his findings, Wang initiated a new mode of raising funds. When patients who did not join in the system came to see a doctor, they could also enjoy a 45-percent reduction in payment. But the deducted money was put into their medical accounts. When their funds reached the amount required by the medical system, they could enjoy future benefits.

Wang's initiative worked and now figures from the Administration Office of New Rural Cooperative Medical System of Ganyu County show that all the farmers in the county are included in the system in 2012.

"The main reason [for the success] is that we showed farmers they can get concrete benefits when they get sick," Wang Lei from the administration office told ChinAfrica.

Regulation required

Ganyu is not the only county to carry out the new rural cooperative medical system in China. Figures from the Office of the Central Rural Working Leading Group show the medical system has now covered 97 percent of farmers nationwide.

"Given this large amount of people involved, it is necessary to have a national law to regulate the operation of the new rural cooperative medical system," Hao Ping, a deputy to the 11th National People's Congress, told legaldaily.com.cn.

However, since the medical system is carried out independently with varying standards in different counties, currently there is no national law to regulate its operation.

Jiangsu is the first province to develop a province-level regulation in this field. After years of investigation and research, the Standing Committee of Jiangsu Provincial People's Congress adopted the Regulations of Jiangsu Province on the New Rural Cooperative Medical System, which came into effect on June 1, 2011.

Meanwhile, Gansu Provincial People's Congress listed similar legislation into its plan of 2012.

However, Hao doesn't think the efforts are enough. "There is no unified national law, and this is the major problem in further developing the medical system," she noted. At the 11th National People's Congress session held in March 2011, she proposed to legislate a national law on the medical system.

"The new rural cooperative medical system should be ensured by a complete legal system consisting of a national law, regional regulations and statutes, so as to protect farmers' legal interests and put the medical system on the right development track," she said.