Shenzhen will build 405 private clinics in 2006 in order to ease its severe hospital shortage, the health bureau said Tuesday.

The health bureau has received 1,369 applications to open clinics, and health experts are grading the applicants according to location, personnel and facilities. The health bureau plans to further open up the health sector to private investment, as the city's government-funded public hospitals can hardly meet the demand. Shenzhen's per capita distribution of hospital beds is among the lowest in big Chinese cities.

However, many people are reluctant to visit private clinics although they are much cheaper and less crowded than public hospitals, because services at such clinics are not covered by most insurance companies or government-sponsored social insurance. Others don't trust private clinics, although all private clinics are required to have licensed doctors and nurses.

Thirty of the 240 private clinics opened in 2004 are facing closure and 50 percent are losing money, an investigation shows.

The spokesperson said an additional 12,000 hospital beds and 900 doctors would be added between 2006 and 2010, when there will be at least one clinic for every 10,000 people.

(Shenzhen Daily March 2, 2006)