Ministry of Health Implements Plan to Improve Rural Migrant Worker Health

June 30, 2006

The Ministry of Health implemented its 2006 Rural Migrant Worker Work Plan according to a May 16 announcement on the Ministry of Health Web site. The plan’s goals include preventing and controlling the spread of AIDS among rural migrant workers and improving infectious disease monitoring capabilities in large urban areas with migrant workers. The plan also seeks to raise the immunization rate among the children of migrant workers and improve workplace health and safety conditions for migrants.

The Ministry of Health implemented its 2006 Rural Migrant Worker Work Plan according to a May 16 announcement on the Ministry of Health Web site. The plan’s goals include preventing and controlling the spread of AIDS among rural migrant workers and improving infectious disease monitoring capabilities in large urban areas with migrant workers. The plan also seeks to raise the immunization rate among the children of migrant workers and improve workplace health and safety conditions for migrants.

In November 2005, Wang Longde, Vice Minister of Health, criticized local governments for limiting HIV/AIDS services to residents with local hukou registration, a policy which excludes many migrant workers from treatment. As a result of the discriminatory hukou system, both unregistered migrant workers and those who hold temporary residence permits often cannot obtain public services such as healthcare when residing in urban areas. [For more information on the hukou system, see the CECC topic paper China's Household Registration System: Sustained Reform Needed to Protect China's Rural Migrants.] This, along with the significant healthcare challenges faced by rural residents due to the collapse of China’s rural public health infrastructure make rural migrant workers a high-risk group for contracting infectious diseases such as HIV/AIDS. HIV statistics released in Shenzhen for the first five months of 2006 show that migrant workers are at a higher risk of contracting HIV/AIDS than the general population, according to a June 28 report in the South China Morning Post. Recognizing the challenge of treating rural migrant workers with HIV/AIDS, the Ministry of Health plan advocates a collaborative effort among the Ministries of Finance, Labor, Construction, and Agriculture, to ensure that migrant workers with the disease obtain free medical treatment. The plan also sets forth the goal of educating more than 60 percent of the rural migrant worker population about HIV/AIDS by the end of 2006.

Many migrant workers are employed in industries in which they are exposed to occupational diseases and other workplace safety hazards, according to comments made by Li Dehong, an expert with the China Center for Disease Control, in an April 24, 2006, Xinhua report. Migrant workers employed by small private enterprises and mines are especially vulnerable to occupational diseases such as pneumoconiosis, a lung disease caused by continued inhalation of mineral or metallic dust, according to a June 9, 2006, Xinhua report. The Ministry of Health’s new plan sets forth a number of goals for improving workplace conditions for rural migrant workers, including implementing health and safety training and instruction programs in mid- and small-scale businesses, and launching collaborative efforts with the World Health Organization and the International Labor Organization.

In October 2001, the National People’s Congress passed the Law on Prevention and Control of Occupational Diseases, however many businesses have not abided by the law, according to a July 16, 2005, China Daily editorial. For more information on workplace health and safety conditions in China, see Section III(c) Protection of Internationally Recognized Labor Rights of the CECC's 2005 Annual Report.