China will build a series of health care big data centers and industrial parks as part of a national pilot program, according to a video conference held on Oct 21 in Beijing.

The video conference promoting the construction of health care big data centers and industrial parks.

Four cities — Fuzhou, Xiamen, Nanjiang, and Changzhou — in East China's Fujian and Jiangsu provinces were chosen as pilot destinations.

Li Bin, minister of the National Health and Family Planning Commission, addresses the video conference on Oct 21 in Beijing.

Li Bin, minister of the National Health and Family Planning Commission (NHFPC), addressed the conference, saying that "applying health care big data to real practices is required in order to promote the Healthy China Strategy and improve the 'sense of gain' for the public."

"It shows strong support for improving health management and an important way to foster new formats and economic growth," Li said.

Health care big data should be used to make the health industry a pillar of the national economy, according to earlier remarks by China's top leadership.

During China's 13th Five-Year Plan (2016-20), the NHFPC will promote the "Internet" plus "health care" service in an all-round manner, and build a four-tier health information platform, covering the country, provinces, cities, and counties.

Three big data bases, able to catalogue and sort population information, electronic health records, and electronic medical records, will be dynamically updated.

The opening ceremony for a pilot project to build health care big data centers and industrial parks.

New formats of health care, including telemedicine platforms or smart health care, will be greatly promoted and information technology, such as cloud computing, big data, and Internet of things, will be integrated with the health care sector.

Top officials from the pilot cities vowed to foster a favorable environment for the project in terms of land, funding, and policies.