The government will beef up surveillance on medical costs and reform its system of fiscal subsidies to hospitals, according to members to the municipal committee of the Chinese People's Political Consultative Conference (CPPCC).

Rising medical expenses and growing complaints about medical services were discussed by the city's political advisers when the Second Session of the Fourth Shenzhen CPPCC opened yesterday.

A medical reform proposal made by some members was listed as the No. 1 proposal for 2006, or the most important of the more than 200 proposals submitted to the meeting yesterday.

Public hospitals shall shoulder more social responsibilities instead of focusing on economic gains, the proposal says. Meanwhile, compensation to medical workers should be independent of hospital revenue, according to the proposal.

"The average outpatient fee was raised from 117 yuan (US$14.44) last year to 138 yuan this year, and the inpatient fee up from 4,200 yuan to 5,200 yuan in the city. We have to do something to curb the trend," said Gao Hua, one of the legislators behind the proposal.

The municipal committee of the CPPCC submitted more than 2,000 proposals and suggestions to the government last year, said its chairman Li Decheng at yesterday's opening session.

Many of them were accepted and carried out by the government, such as the proposals on building the cultural industry as the fourth pillar industry, marking the year 2005 as a year for relic protection, and streamlining government approval procedures for major investment projects, to name just a few.

The political advisory body, a combination of members from various parties under the leadership of the Communist Party of China, met 13 international delegations including foreign legislators last year, said Li.

Out of the 655 proposals submitted to the government by advisers last year, 99.8 percent were responded to, said Jiang Zhong, vice chairwoman of the municipal CPPCC.

(Shenzhen Daily March 21, 2006)