Where are water and sanitation in China’s rural healthcare
reform?  Bookmark and Share  Guest blog by Angela Ni, Fulbright
Fellow 2010-2011, Yunnan, China (angela.ni@fulbrightmail.org)
In China, the past 30 years of economic growth has lifted
roughly 600 million people out of poverty (based on $1.25 per
day). Improving health conditions reinforced this economic boom.
Since 1952, average life expectancy has increased from 35 to 74
years, nearly doubling an individual’s life and potential
earnings. From 1949 until the 1970s, the Chinese government
invested heavily in the country’s basic health care system,
creating communal village and township clinics, and employing
the now infamous “barefoot doctors.” During my research, I have
visited the modern equivalent of “barefoot clinics,” where
today’s farmers receive basic medical treatment. However, with
increased marketization, China’s communist past of collectivized
health services has been superseded by fee-for-service
privatized healthcare.  Village clinic in Y