An elderly woman receives COVID-19 vaccine booster in Shanghai. Photo: VCG

China on Friday issues guidelines to further optimize tiered medical services for people aged 65 and above, calling on local authorities to enhance contracted medical services and strengthen the storage of drugs and antigen detection kits.

The guidelines require local authorities to register local people aged 65 and above as well as their health condition and vaccination history. According to the conditions and the level of the potential severity of the diseases after infection, these people will be classified into three different groups – high-, medium- and low-risk groups.

To the low-risk group, local authorities should encourage them to get vaccinated and live a healthy lifestyle.

For people classified as the medium-risk group, they should report to the community or the village if they get infected and showed no mild symptoms, and should stay at home for self-quarantine. 

Via the internet, phone or visiting the quarantined people’s home, local authorities should provide guidance to these people on antigen detection and treatment. Health monitoring facility should be used if necessary, according to the guidelines.

Local medical workers should visit these people’s homes every three days until the self-quarantine is over, the guideline said.

As to the high-risk group, as well as other people in need for emergency medical service such as children and pregnant women, local authorities should assist them in moving to a referral hospital if necessary.

For the disabled elderly who have difficulty in moving, local authorities should organize experts to evaluate their condition before deciding treatment for them.

The guidelines also call for sound implementation of the contracted services of family doctors for key groups. It called on to accelerate the increase in the coverage of contracted services for the elderly over 65 years old, to achieve full coverage of contracted services for the elderly with underlying diseases, and to do a good job in health management and health monitoring in accordance with the principle of classification and grading. 

Strengthen the contact between family doctors and contracted elderly people to ensure that when they need medical treatment, they or their family members can contact the family doctor in time, read the guideline.

The guidelines also require local authorities to strengthen the storage of drugs and antigen detection kits in primary medical and health institutions. All localities should increase supply guarantees to ensure that grass-roots medical and health institutions, dynamically stock Chinese traditional medicines, antipyretic and cough-relieving drugs, and antigen detection reagents at the rate of 15-20 percent of the total serving population, read the guidelines.

The guidelines also emphasized on accelerating the construction of fever clinics (outpatient clinics) in township health centers and community health service centers, and to increase the coverage rate to about 90 percent population by the end of March 2023.

Global Times