Full Text: Development of China's Public Health as an Essential Element of Human Rights (4)

Source: Xinhua| 2017-09-29 18:07:21|Editor: huaxia
Video PlayerClose

II. Continuous Improvement of Health Environment and Conditions

China is keen to promote a healthy lifestyle, national fitness and health education, protect food and drinking water safety, and improve the environment for production, people's life, ecology and society in order to better guarantee the Chinese people's right to health.

Developing a healthy lifestyle. In 2007, China launched the Healthy Lifestyle for All campaign, calling on the Chinese people to develop a healthy diet and engage in physical exercises, advocating healthy lifestyle ideas, creating a supporting environment for a healthy lifestyle, and enhancing the people's awareness and behavioral abilities to develop a healthy lifestyle. By the end of 2016, the campaign had covered 81.87 percent of counties (districts) across the country. China published the Chinese Dietary Guidelines (2016) that provides healthy dietary guidance to the Chinese people in general, and to children and the elderly in particular to help them develop a balanced diet and nutrition absorption; the government has intensified monitoring of the Chinese people's nutritional status and health conditions while keeping track of, and issue information about chronic diseases and the people's nutritional status; it urges the Chinese people to reduce their salt intake, and publicizes information on how to prevent and control high blood pressure; it has adopted measures to improve the nutritional status of key populations and instituted a nutritional improvement plan for compulsory education students in rural areas as well as nutritional improvement programs for children in poverty-stricken areas; the government is continuing to tighten control on the use of tobacco and implement the WHO Framework Convention on Tobacco Control. In 2014, Shenzhen began to activate the Regulations of the Shenzhen Special Economic Zone on Smoking Control; in 2015, Beijing implemented the Beijing Regulation on Smoking Control; in 2017, Shanghai enacted revised Regulations of Shanghai Municipality on Smoking Control in Public Places, banning indoor smoking in public areas. By the end of 2016, 18 cities had adopted regulations on a smoke-free environment, covering one tenth of the population.

Giving full play to national physical fitness. Physical fitness has become a national strategy, and the work regarding people's physical fitness has been included in economic and social development plans, fiscal budgets and annual work reports of governments at all levels. A development trajectory of nationwide physical fitness "led by the government, coordinated among relevant sectors and participated by all" has taken shape. Since the National Fitness Regulations were promulgated in 2009, 16 provinces and ten major cities have worked out local regulations on fitness for all, and all of the country's 31 provinces, autonomous regions and municipalities directly under the central government have worked out provincial-level fitness-for-all programs. Since 2009, August 8 has become National Fitness Day in China. From 2011 to 2014, 3,405 fitness centers, 9,447 community multipurpose sports playgrounds, 2,366 sports parks, 24,879 fitness squares and 878 outdoor camps were established nationwide, with 1.69 million outdoor fitness facilities installed. Physical fitness venues and facilities can be found in communities (administrative villages), sub-districts (towns and townships), counties (districts) and cities (prefectures). By the end of 2015, up to 33.9 percent of the whole population engaged in physical exercises on a regular basis; the per capita sports venue area reached 1.57 square meters; the coverage rate of sports associations at county level and above was 72 percent; the number of various kinds of juvenile sports clubs was 7,147; every ten thousand people shared three fitness centers on average, and thus a popular national fitness network was basically formed.

Promoting national health education. Publicity media, such as newspapers, television, radio, the Internet and other forms of new media are utilized for public health publicity, education and consultation to help people develop a self-tailored and self-disciplined healthy lifestyle. China celebrates National Environment and Health Publicity Week every year; it has promulgated the Environment and Health Literacy of the Chinese Citizens (Trial) and a code of conduct for Chinese citizens with the slogan "Breathe the same air and get it done together" to improve air quality and intensify publicity and education through basic public health services and health education, health literacy promotion campaigns, the "Healthy Chinese" and "TCM in China" initiatives, and major theme-day public health publicity. Health awareness in both urban and rural areas rose to 10.25 percent in 2015 from 6.48 percent in 2008.

Vigorously pursuing environmental improvement. Joint pollution prevention and control between different regions has been enhanced; air quality monitoring facilities at county and district levels in the Beijing-Tianjin-Hebei region, the Yangtze River Delta and the Pearl River Delta function as a network; a network monitoring particle matter (PM) and photochemical pollutants in the Beijing-Tianjin-Hebei region and neighboring areas is in full operation. From 2011 to 2015, the nationwide chemical oxygen demand, emissions of ammonia nitrogen, sulfur dioxide, and nitrogen oxide decreased by 12.9 percent, 13 percent, 18 percent and 18.6 percent, respectively. In 2016, the PM 2.5 average concentration dropped by 6.0 percent year on year and the number of days with excellent and good air quality increased by 2.1 percentage points year on year in 338 cities at the prefectural level and above. In 2013, China enacted the Air Pollution Prevention and Control Action Plan; from 2014 to 2016, about 16 million heavily-polluting vehicles and old vehicles that couldn't meet the environmental protection standards were eliminated; all coal-fired generators have realized desulfurization and denitrification; ultra-low emissions have been encouraged, and by March 2017 coal-fired generators of about 500 million kw had been improved to achieve ultra-low emissions; the Action Plan for the Prevention and Control of Soil Pollution has been enacted, and a comprehensive survey of soil pollution has been launched; the Rules on Environmental Management of the Soil of Contaminated Sites (Trial) have been promulgated. A fund for soil pollution prevention and control has been set up, and from 2016 to 2017, RMB15 billion was earmarked by the government for this purpose. A national soil environment network has been primarily established, with 22,000 basic monitoring spots and about 15,000 risk-monitoring stations; the Action Plan for the Prevention and Control of Water Pollution has been promoted and completely implemented; the comprehensive management of the environment surrounding the river valleys has been enhanced; the environmental protection of the Yangtze River Economic Belt has been pursued, and the investigation of black and odorous water bodies in urban areas has been carried out; in 2016, according to the state-controlled monitoring bodies of surface water, the proportion of such spots of Grades I-III reached 67.8 percent, while that of inferior water bodies of Grade V dropped to 8.6 percent. (more)

KEY WORDS:
YOU MAY LIKE
EXPLORE XINHUANET
010020070750000000000000011100001366487951