Be Devoted to the Rural Areas and Create a Legend Together

25 Feb. 2021, The National Poverty Alleviation Commendation Conference was held in Beijing, which marks the rolling victory of China’s fight against poverty. China’s poverty alleviation campaign has created a legend in the human history of poverty eradication, and we are honoured to be part of it and make some contributions. We are honoured to see that Fosun is recognized as a leading organization, which represents recognition from the country, and reminds me the responsibilities on our shoulders.

“Self-improvement, Teamwork, Performance, and Contribution to Society” are the values established by Fosun at its start-up. With the expertise of Fosun in healthcare, we jointly launched the “Health by Heart – Rural Doctors Poverty Alleviation” program with China Population Welfare Foundation and China Society for Promotion of the Guangcai Program at the end of 2017 under the guidance of the Poverty Alleviation Office of the National Health Commission. To solve the problem concerning poverty-stricken population in China, we must first give them access to medical care. Only by improving the medical system in rural areas, can we truly solve the problem of “poverty caused by disease” in rural areas and truly eliminate poverty. I was born in rural area, and many of us got the help from rural doctors when we were young, so we know very well the difficulties rural doctors face.

Looking back at the amazing experiences participating in the “Rural Doctors” program, there are many scenes that have deeply touched me. I remember that I drove from Yan’an for 3 hours to Qingjian County and Zizhou County in Yulin City in June 2018 and visited the local township health clinics and village clinics with the local resident team members of the Rural Doctors poverty alleviation program. After I communicated with Doctor Zheng Zhuqian in Zhengjiajian Village, I became convinced that we must train more rural doctors of the younger generation. Doctor Zheng was 65 years old then and had a minor operation at the beginning of the year, taking only 15 days off before returning to work. In the future, we will use more modern technologies to help rural clinics connect with hospitals at the county, city, provincial levels, as well as in Beijing and Shanghai to better train doctors.

Another rural doctor who impressed me a lot is Li Yuzhong, known as the “Lighter Doctor”. I interviewed him last year at the “Healthy China 2020 Top 10 Heart-warming Rural Doctors and 10 Village Hospital Directors Awarding Ceremony” in Qingdao. In his 13-year medical career, Doctor Li had never turned off his phone. He left his phone number to the old people in the village, yet they often lost the paper with his phone number on it because they put the paper in their pockets. He then simply ordered a batch of customized lighters with his name and phone number printed on them and sent one lighter to each of the old people when they came to seek medical advice from him. Since then, the name of “Lighter Doctor” Li Yuzhong has become a household name all over the village.

Nowadays, waves of volunteers are devoting themselves to the frontline work of “Rural Doctors”. Every year, we will select excellent employees from member enterprises of Fosun and excellent university students from volunteers in the Go West Plan of the Central Committee of the Communist Youth League of China, to take part in the frontline work as full-time volunteers for one year in the county where the Program has a site. Fosun has fully mobilized its resources by launching the “One Person for One County” partner assistance program among its global partners to put poverty alleviation into practice. We support the rural doctors; and the rural doctors support our rural people. Looking ahead, Fosun will continue to make great efforts on the “Rural Doctors” program, and we welcome more forces to join the team of rural doctor guardians. Let’s work together!