On May 17, local time, the Chinese delegation of the 79th World Health Assembly held a briefing in Geneva, Switzerland, to introduce the progress and effectiveness of the construction of Healthy China, as well as China's experience in deeply participating in global health governance and promoting building a Global Community of Health for All, and answered reporters' questions on issues of widespread concern to the international community.

 We are more confident that we will make decisive progress during the 15th Five-Year Plan period

"The Chinese government formed a delegation to the World Health Organization to participate in this conference, which shows China's sincerity, China's willingness to cooperate, and the confidence and determination to sincerely participate in global health governance." Lei Haichao, head of the Chinese delegation and minister of the National Health Commission said. In the past 10 years, positive results and progress have been made in the construction of Healthy China, which made him more confident that China will make decisive progress during the "15th Five-Year Plan" period.

In the past 10 years, China has implemented the prevention-oriented policy and continued to improve its public health system, and its capacity and level have been greatly improved. The health literacy of the whole population has continued to improve, and the health literacy of residents has increased to 33.69%, which is basically increasing at a rate of 1-2 percentage points per year. China has withstood the severe impact of COVID-19 pandemic, creating a miracle that a populous country has successfully emerged from the pandemic. At the same time, from 2020 to 2023, the average life expectancy of Chinese residents has continued to increase. By the end of 2025, it reached 79.25 years.

In the past 10 years, China's medical service system has been continuously improved and the accessibility and convenience of services have been greatly improved. At present, China's 1.108 million medical and health institutions are spread across urban and rural areas, creating the world's most complete medical and health service system. China has always attached great importance to primary health care, and 1.055 million primary medical and health institutions provide support for the health of the masses. China's overseas authorization of innovative drugs exceeded US$135.6 billion in 2025, and China is providing services to improve global health. Nearly 30 national medical centers and hundreds of national regional medical centers have been established across the country, forming integrated health care system, carrying out itinerant medical care, and continuously improving the capacity and level of primary medical services.

In the past 10 years, the inheritance, innovation and development of traditional Chinese medicine have continued to reach a new level, accounting for about 20% of the nearly 10.6 billion outpatient amount in the country. The ability and level of traditional Chinese medicine to treat difficult and severe diseases have been continuously improved, providing new possibilities and ideas for dealing with emerging infectious diseases.

In the past 10 years, the construction of a healthy China has paid more attention to the co-construction and sharing of the whole people, and insisted on combining health services with mass work. For example, in the process of preventing and controlling insect-borne infectious diseases, China has achieved good results in dealing with the local epidemic spread caused by the import of chikungunya in individual cities last year.

Over the past 10 years, China has continued to deepen health exchanges and cooperation under the "Belt and Road", dispatching medical teams to developing countries all year round, actively imparting China's advanced technology and management experience, and cultivating a large number of local medical talents. While actively solving its own health problems, China has also contributed Chinese solutions and Chinese experience to international health development and governance.

"The next five years are even more worth looking forward to, there is a very important indicator, by 2030, the average life expectancy of Chinese residents will reach 80 years, and Chinese people will become healthier and happier." Lei Haichao said.

Together, we can contribute to the improvement of global health and well-being

Healthy China is not only for the health of more than 1.4 billion Chinese people, but also enhances the cohesion of the health and well-being of people around the world.

Lei Haichao pointed out that China attaches great importance to cooperation and exchanges with the World Health Organization, and with the accumulation of China's experience in participating in international health affairs and the improvement of its comprehensive national strength, China has more opportunities to share its development experience with everyone and promote the further development of global health governance.

China has long firmly supported the World Health Organization to play a leading and coordinating role in global health affairs and to better play its role in global health governance. China promotes the implementation of the Global Development Initiative, the Global Security Initiative, the Global Civilization Initiative, and the Global Governance Initiative, and promote the construction of a community with a shared future for mankind and a Global Community of Health for All. In the past year, China and the World Health Organization have strengthened cooperation and exchanges at different levels, and reached some consensus on key issues such as infectious disease prevention and control, traditional medicine and health technology innovation. Positive progress has been made and is being made by actively supporting the WHO's role at the technical level, such as deep participation in the negotiations on the Pandemic Agreement and related annexes. Fruitful collaboration with global and regional organizations such as the G20, BRICS, the Shanghai Cooperation Organization and the Asia-Pacific Economic Cooperation (APEC). 

"China began to send medical teams in 1963 and has persisted for more than 60 years." Lei Haichao said that China has sent more than 30,000 medical team members and provided more than 300 million medical services to local residents, improving the level of public health and medical services.

At present, many countries around the world are facing the threat of public health emergencies. Under the leadership and coordination of the World Health Organization and the cooperation of governments, the relevant risks have been well controlled. "These are new positive developments in global health cooperation, and China is willing to work with other countries to deepen health exchanges and cooperation under the platform of the World Health Organization, and jointly improve the safety level of global public health through exchanges of technology, resources, and manpower." "We will continue to strengthen cooperation and jointly promote the improvement of global health and well-being.”

In an important period of steady progress in multilateral cooperation and deepening people-to-people ties, only by abandoning differences and walking hand in hand can we better respond to the needs of the times and the people. "It should be emphasized that this year marks the 55th anniversary of the restoration of the lawful seat of the People's Republic of China in the United Nations. China will continue to firmly support the work of the United Nations and actively promote cooperation with UN agencies, including the WHO. "said Jia Guide, Permanent Representative of the People's Republic of China to the United Nations Office at Geneva and other International Organizations in Switzerland, Ambassador Extraordinary and Plenipotentiary. China's decision not to agree to the participation of the Taiwan region in this year's WHA has received extensive support from the international community. A very small number of countries have, for the 10th consecutive year, pushed a proposal on "inviting Taiwan to participate in the WHA as an observer," once again staging a farce that is deeply unpopular. He believed that the right choice would be made at this year's WHA.

"At present, global health governance is facing new and severe challenges." Lei Haichao said that China will work with the international community to promote the construction of a fair, effective and sustainable global public health system, actively fulfill international obligations, maintain global public health security, implement the outcomes of the Beijing Summit of the Forum on China-Africa Cooperation, actively carry out public health development cooperation, strengthen cross-border prevention and control cooperation in infectious diseases, and promote the construction of a global public health talent team.

Working together to build a global climate and health adaptation system

At present, addressing global climate change and its health impacts has become an important public health issue that governments and departments urgently need to solve. The Chinese government has thoroughly implemented Xi Jinping Thought on Ecological Civilization, actively promoted the national strategy to address climate change and the strategy of building Healthy China, continuously improved the public health security system, and adopted firm governance actions and preventive and control measures to adapt to climate change and protect people's health.

At the briefing, Shen Hongbing, deputy head of the Chinese delegation, deputy director of the National Health Commission, and director of the National Disease Control and Prevention Administration, introduced China's practical highlights. In terms of implementing health strategies for climate change adaptation, in 2024, 13 national departments, including the National Disease Control and Prevention Administration, the National Development and Reform Commission, the Ministry of Finance, the Ministry of Ecology and Environment, the National Health Commission, and the China Meteorological Administration, issued the China National Climate Change Health Adaptation Action Plan (2024–2030), deploying 10 key tasks. In 2025, 16 departments, including the National Disease Control and Prevention Administration, the National Development and Reform Commission, the Ministry of Ecology and Environment, the National Health Commission, and the State Administration of Traditional Chinese Medicine, formulated the "Implementation Plan for Healthy China Action - Healthy Environment Promotion Action (2025-2030)" to integrate health concepts into adaptation actions in various fields. This year, the National Disease Control and Prevention Administration will release the Community Action Guide for Health Adaptation to Climate Change, aiming to promote and guide grassroots communities to strengthen climate change health resilience.

In terms of climate change health risk monitoring and early warning, China has independently developed an early prediction and early warning system for extreme weather health risks that adapt to the characteristics of China's climate change, and provides accurate and graded early warning of climate health risks such as air pollution, extreme heat, and cold waves. The National Bureau of Disease Control and Prevention and the China Meteorological Administration jointly issued health risk prediction and early warning products for high temperature weather, and issued guidelines for national health protection in extreme weather such as high temperature heat waves, low temperature cold waves, floods and typhoons, to improve public adaptability.

In terms of technology empowerment and adaptability, China has strengthened joint scientific and technological research on climate and health, and built a "key open laboratory of meteorology and medical health" and a "key laboratory of environment and health". The National Climate Change and Health Expert Committee was established to provide technological support.

Relying on the comprehensive environmental health monitoring platform, we have successfully integrated multi-source environmental and health data from more than 400 districts and counties across 31 provincial-level administrative regions nationwide, and established a standardized database with a scale exceeding 100 million entries.

In terms of promoting China's model on participating in global governance, China firmly upholds multilateral mechanisms such as the United Nations Framework Convention on Climate Change and the World Health Organization, and government departments, experts and scholars actively contribute to promoting the integration of health issues into global climate governance. Tianjin's "High Temperature Health Action" and Zunyi's "Climate-Sensitive Disease Early Warning Capacity Building" were both selected as global cases and special displayed at the 30th United Nations Climate Change Conference (COP30) "Belém Health Action Library", showing their international influence.

In the future, China will continue to accelerate the construction of Healthy China, promote the implementation of climate change healthy adaptation actions, build a climate health adaptation plan with early warning as the guide and population health as the core, and work with the international community to build a global climate and health adaptation system, so as to contribute China's wisdom and strength to global climate governance.