Mechanisms of Accountability for the Realization of the Right to Health in China

Qiu, Shengnan; Macnaughton, Gillian

The second stage, which involves distributing health resources within the health sector, is a complicated process. In China, both the central government and the provincial governments have the power to collect taxes, distribute resources, and make polices, provided policies made at the provincial level are not in conflict with those at the central level. 60 Thus, at the provincial level, resources for health are composed of two parts: allocations from the provincial budget and allocations from the central government. 61 Inequalities in health budgets among different provinces exist due to the unbalanced levels of economic development across provinces, which result from both provincial development strategies and uneven central policies designed by the State Council. Consequently, although the central level budget is equitable, the provincial portion of the health budget varies greatly across provinces, and there is no accountability mechanism to challenge the uneven economic development or the health budget differences among provinces.