BEIJING -- The Standing Committee of the National People's Congress (NPC) has recently launched an enforcement inspection of the Law on Traditional Chinese Medicine (TCM), the first of its kind since the law went into effect in 2017.

From April to early May, inspection teams will be dispatched to eight provinces, including Shanxi, Zhejiang and Fujian. The NPC Standing Committee will also entrust legislatures in eight other provinces to inspect the enforcement of the law in their own regions, according to the first plenary meeting of the inspection teams held Wednesday in Beijing.

Attending the meeting, Wang Chen, a member of the Political Bureau of the Communist Party of China Central Committee and vice chairman of the NPC Standing Committee, said that the purpose of the inspection is to promote the full application of the new development philosophy, tackle problems and shortcomings in law implementation and contribute to the Healthy China initiative.

He also urged strict implementation of the law, giving full play to TCM and improving the TCM-related legal system through inspection.

The inspection will focus on the role of TCM in advancing the Healthy China initiative, in epidemic prevention and control, as well as TCM-related talent training and team building, among other things.

The inspection teams will discuss the report of the law-enforcement inspection in May and report to the NPC Standing Committee in late June.