More than 180 hospital leaders, including Communist Party secretaries and hospital heads, have been put under investigation so far this year, according to state agency China News Service, with at least 10 of those voluntarily surrendering since June. That’s more than double the number of such cases last year, according to other state media reports.
“Given the economic slowdown and the shrinking fiscal revenue, the debt-ridden local governments really don’t have the capabilities to invest more in the medical sector and corruption continues to be an issue,” said Huang. “If you don’t invest in the medical sector … then the people’s dissatisfaction will continue to rise, so they need a scapegoat to solve that problem – medical representatives, hospital managers, doctors are forced to become that scapegoat,” he said.