Communicable disease control in China: From Mao to now

Hipgrave, David

Much has been written about China' s initial denial of the extent of the SARS outbreak (67) , and the implications for its control (68) . The events occurred despite preceding attempts to renovate the EPSs, as described above, but there is no denying that China remained grossly ill-equipped to deal with a disease of this nature in 2003, and government hugely increased its support for CDC (physical infrastructure, staffing and funding) after this shock (39) . Two other major CDC-related impacts of SARS in China were undertaken. First was the revision of the Law on Infectious Diseases in August 2004, mandating the reporting of 37 notifiable conditions, including immediate reporting of certain diagnoses and replacing a system which had essentially become optional and mainly answerable to local government, not the CDC hierarchy. As a result, in restoring its population health objectives CDC was mainstreamed in China' s health sector, with both the curative and disease-control sectors responsible for prevention, reporting and management of infectious diseases (Dr Yang Weizhong, China CDC, personal communication) (Figure 4) .