China is carrying out a massive anticorruption purge across its healthcare sector, in an effort to bring down medical costs and revive the country’s flagging economy, the Wall Street Journal reported. Communist Party enforcers have steamrolled through hospitals and medical institutions across China, detaining more than 190 hospital party chiefs, directors and deputy directors—incumbent and former—so far this year, according to a Wall Street Journal review of government disclosures. A retired provincial party chief, who held a top government role overseeing healthcare reforms from 2010 to 2015, was detained in late August for allegedly committing “severe violations of discipline and law”—a euphemism for corruption. The campaign has spooked investors. The CSI 300 healthcare index, which tracks China’s largest drugmakers and medical-equipment companies, has fallen 15% so far this year, far outpacing the 3.5% decline on the broader CSI 300 index. The party has targeted corruption in its healthcare industry in the past, but this year’s campaign has been particularly forceful, echoing recent crackdowns on internet giants and the after-school tutoring industry that have altered swaths of the economy.
Read more. (Subscription required.)
Location