Death in China

New Left Review

Volumn , Issue 45, 2007, Pages 49-65

  Reddy, Sanjay ^a  

^a NONE

Author keywords

[No Author keywords available]

Indexed keywords

EID: 34547351431     PISSN: 00286060     EISSN: None     Source Type: Journal    
DOI: None     Document Type: Review

References (30)

1. I would like to thank Camelia Minoiu for her extensive assistance with research for this paper, going well beyond what could be reasonably expected.
2. Lawrence Summers and Lant Pritchett, 'Wealthier is Healthier', Journal of Human Resources, vol. 31, no. 4 (1996), pp. 841-68, rely on cross-country evidence;
3. historical evidence is used by Richard Steckel and Roderick Floud, eds, Health and Welfare during Industrialization, Chicago 1997.
4. and Steckel, 'Historical Perspective on the Standard of Living Using Anthropometric Data', in Edward Wolff, ed., What Has Happened to the Quality of Life in the Advanced Industrialized Nations?, London 2004, pp. 257-74.
5. For more on this comparison, see Jean Drèze and Amartya Sen, Hunger and Public Action, Oxford 1989.
6. Although estimates of China's infant and child mortality rates are available for earlier years, doubt has been cast on their reliability. See Judith Banister and Kenneth Hill, 'Mortality in China 1964-2000', Population Studies, vol. 58, no. I (2004), pp. 55-75.
7. Life expectancy figures for 1973-75 and 1981 are from Simona Bignami-Van Assche, 'Estimating Life Expectancy at Birth for China's Provinces, 1975-1990: A Note', Population Studies Center, University of Pennsylvania, mimeo 2005. The figures for 1973-75 are derived from the Cancer Epidemiology Survey undertaken in 1976, which was the largest mortality survey in human history, and recorded all causes of death although its focus was deaths from cancer. The figures for 1981 are taken from census data. Life expectancy figures for 1990 and 2000 are from the China Statistical Yearbook, Beijing 2003, Table 4-17, p. 118.
8. Each class consists of ages higher than the first figure specified, and less than or equal to the second. Admittedly, these intervals are defined in an ad hoc manner. Moreover, different levels of absolute increase in life expectancy can be associated with the same proportionate increase for different provinces within the same class, since each class spans a number of years. A different definition of the life expectancy classes might lead to different conclusions.
9. Countries are assigned to the lower-middle income group based on their 2004 per capita GDP ranking; see World Development Indicators 2006, available online. Between 1980 and 2000, China moved from the low income category to the lower-middle group. It might be thought that low-income countries are therefore the appropriate set of comparators for China. However, none of these countries achieved China's 2000 male or female life expectancy by 2004, and very few achieved even China's 1981 level by the end of the period.
10. The former group of countries consists of Bolivia, Djibouti, Dominican Republic, Fiji, Guatemala, Guyana, Honduras, Indonesia, Iraq, Kazakhstan, Kiribati, Namibia, Swaziland and Turkmenistan. The latter group comprises Angola, Armenia, Belarus, Brazil, Cape Verde, Egypt, El Salvador, Georgia, Maldives, Micronesia, Morocco, Paraguay, Peru, Philippines, Romania, Samoa, Suriname, Thailand, Ukraine and Vanuatu. There is no data prior to 1987 for Macedonia and the Marshall Islands, and Bulgaria had achieved China's 1981 male life expectancy before 1960. These three countries have therefore been eliminated from the analysis, which includes only those states for which both female and male figures are available.
11. Though not shown here, the figures for total life expectancy for specific comparator countries point to similar conclusions; they are available from the author upon request.
12. The results are not reported, but are available from the author upon request.
13. Giovanni Cornia and Leonardo Menchini, 'The pace and distribution of health improvements during the last 40 years: some preliminary results', paper presented at the 'Forum on Human Development', Paris, 17-19 January 2005, Tables 5 and 7.
14. Xiaobo Zhang and Ravi Kanbur, 'Spatial Inequality in Education and Health Care in China', CEPR Discussion Paper no. 4136 (2003).
15. Yuanli Liu, William Hsiao and Karen Eggleston, 'Equity in health and health care: the Chinese experience', Social Science and Medicine, vol. 49 (1999), pp. 1349-56.
16. Xin Meng, Xiaodong Gong and Youjuan Wang, 'Impact of Income Growth and Economic Reform on Nutrition Intake in Urban China: 1986-2000', IZA Institute for the Study of Labour Discussion Paper no. 1448 (2004).
17. See Yuanli Liu, 'What is Wrong with China's Health System?', Harvard China Review, March 2006;
18. Howard French, 'Wealth Grows, but Health Care Withers in China', New York Times, 14 January 2006;
19. Louisa Lim, 'The High Price of Illness in China', BBC News website, 2 March 2006;
20. and Matthew Forney, 'China's Failing Health System', Time, 12 May 2003.
21. See Yasheng Huang, 'Private Sector Development and Health Care Contributions in China', presented at Harvard Business School and Harvard School of Public Health conference, New Delhi, 25 March 2006;
22. and Liu, 'What is Wrong with China's Health System?'.
23. Migration News, vol. 14, no. 1 (2007).
24. Lim, 'High Price of Illness'. The literature on the complex institutional background to China's health system is extensive; for a concise overview, see David Blumenthal and William Hsiao, 'Privatization and Its Discontents - the Evolving Chinese Health Care System', New England Journal of Medicine, vol. 353, no. 11 (Sept 2005), pp. 1165-70.
25. For further data, see WHO and Government of China, China: Health, Poverty and Economic Development, Beijing 2006;
26. see also four World Bank reports: Mariam Claeson, Hong Wang and Shanlian Hu, A Critical Review of Public Health in China;
27. Yuanli Liu, Zhengzhong Mao and Brian Nolan, China's Rural Health Insurance and Financing: A Critical Review.
28. Gordon Liu, Brian Nolan and Chen Wen, Urban Health Insurance and Financing in China;
29. Peter Smith, Christine Wong and Yuxin Zhao, Public Expenditure and Resource Allocation in the Health Sector in China, all Washington, DC 2004.
30. Blumenthal and Hsiao, 'Privatization and Its Discontents', p. 1170.