The hospital, which was built for 7 years with an investment of 3 billion yuan, is now idle

Are the two hospital projects in Fuqing City abandoned? "

Recently, a question on the" People's Daily Online "leadership message board has brought two long established hospitals back into the public eye, namely Southern Medical University Fuqing Hospital and Fuzhou Haixi Stomatological Hospital

Taking the former as an example, 7 years ago, the hospital was established with the development goal of becoming the first tertiary comprehensive hospital in Fuqing. The total planned investment was 3 billion yuan, covering an area of about 340 acres, with 2100 beds. After completion, it is expected to meet the outpatient needs of 6000 people per day and is an important project to alleviate the shortage of high-quality medical resources in the local area

Today, 7 years later, the hospital has not yet been built and put into use. The official response is that it is "idle due to financial difficulties of the project owner who cannot continue to invest"

After 7 years of construction, the hospital became idle. In 2015, when news of the project for construction was announced at Southern Medical University's Fuqing Hospital, it attracted considerable attention

According to reports from the Investment Promotion Bureau of Fuqing City, the hospital is jointly built by Xiangxing Group and Southern Medical University Medical Management Group. Its full name is Fuqing Affiliated Hospital of Southern Medical University Medical Management Group, and it is located in the Fuqing Railway Station area of Longjiang Street, covering an area of about 340 acres

The hospital is positioned as a comprehensive and international tertiary Grade A hospital that integrates "medicine, education, research, care, and health", including a medical research center, a teaching and training center, and a rehabilitation medicine center

Among them, the investment and construction party Xiangxing Group is a private enterprise headquartered in Fuqing. The company's official website claims that it is the world's largest luggage manufacturing enterprise and China's largest linen textile enterprise, with over 35000 registered employees. The cooperating party, Southern Medical University Medical Management Group, is a professional hospital management company

On October 1, 2017, Southern Medical University's Fuqing Hospital officially started construction in the Fuqing Railway Station area. Social capital, medical management group, and local government cooperated to jointly create a private public assisted non-profit hospital

According to the plan, the hospital will become the first tertiary comprehensive hospital in Fuqing City after completion, filling the gap of local private tertiary comprehensive hospitals. It is planned to open 40 clinical departments, covering medical, education, scientific research, rehabilitation, elderly care and other fields. It will also develop international medical services and set up 10 academician workstations

For such a grand construction project, the local community is full of enthusiasm. The street office where the hospital is located completed the land acquisition task for 117 acres of land in just one month. One year after the hospital started construction, local leaders visited the construction site and proposed to make the hospital project a model project in Fuqing City

By the end of 2018, the hospital was still accelerating its construction. According to local media reports, the hospital is expected to complete its infrastructure construction in 2019 and commence operations in December 2020

At this time, the investment party of the hospital project has also shown greater ambition, stating that they will invest an additional 1.5 billion yuan to build a nursing center and carry out the "medical elderly integration" business

However, just as various sectors in the local area were eagerly anticipating the completion of the new hospital, the construction progress suddenly slowed down and ultimately failed to open as scheduled

After exceeding the original opening time by 4 months, in April 2021, Fuqing Southern Hospital finally completed the topping out of the main structure of the first phase of the project. The expected time for deployment has also been postponed to the end of 2022 or early 2023

However, until today, the hospital has not yet opened for consultations and has fallen into long-term disuse

Another hospital has been under construction for 7 years without opening.

For Fuqing City, introducing social capital to run a hospital is an exploration based on the local medical level and economic characteristics.

Fuqing is a county-level city under the administration of Fuzhou City. As early as 2015, local media reported that the medical and health services in Fuqing City were not adapted to the growing needs of the people, and the diversified social medical service pattern was not yet perfect, which could not meet the needs of different levels of medical services

According to information released by the Fuqing Municipal Government in June this year, there are still no tertiary hospitals in the city. The tertiary hospital, Fuqing City Hospital, is the medical center of the entire city

In addition, the total number of beds in Fuqing city is 5772, with 4.15 beds per thousand population. By comparison, in 2023, the number of beds in medical and health institutions per thousand population in China will be 7.23, which is nearly twice the level of Fuqing

According to a report on the website of the Fuzhou Municipal Committee of the Chinese People's Political Consultative Conference in February this year, Wei Yan, a senior lecturer in the Clinical Department of Fuqing Health School, stated that the "software and hardware" of medical institutions in towns and villages urgently need to be upgraded. For example, Jiangyin Town in Fuqing City has only 0.32 beds per thousand population, far below the average level of Fuqing City

Various phenomena indicate that there has been a long-term problem of insufficient and uneven distribution of high-quality medical resources in Fuqing City, and the local government has always been looking for ways to expand high-quality medical resources

The good news is that Fujian Province has a large number of strong private enterprises, so for many years, Fuqing City has been actively exploring the model of social capital participation in medical treatment

In 2017, He Fei, then Deputy Director of the Health and Family Planning Bureau of Fuqing City, publicly stated that he would guide social capital to enter the Fuqing medical market, promote the landing and operation of multiple private hospitals, and strive to make up about 25% of the total number of beds in medical institutions in the city

Southern Medical University Fuqing Hospital is one of the important projects for local social capital to participate in medical treatment. On the eve of the construction of the hospital, Fuzhou Haixi Stomatological Hospital, invested and built by Fuzhou Haixi Stomatological Hospital Co., Ltd., also broke ground in the Fuqing Railway Station area

Public information shows that the total investment of Fuzhou Haixi Stomatological Hospital is 280 million yuan, with a total construction area of over 60000 square meters. It is planned to build Fuzhou Haixi Stomatological Hospital, Fuqing Xingzhi Integrated Traditional Chinese and Western Medicine Hospital, Eye, Ear, Nose and Throat Specialized Hospital, Ward Comprehensive Building, Logistics Center, and Dormitory Building, etc., making it a demonstration point for medical cooperation between Fujian and Taiwan in the province and even the whole country

Unfortunately, Haixi Dental Hospital has been built for 7 years and has not yet opened

On the "People's Daily Online" leadership message board, the local government of Fuqing responded to netizens that the Fuqing Hospital and Haixi Stomatological Hospital of Southern Medical University were idle due to financial difficulties of project owners and could not continue to invest. The relevant departments of the city have contacted the project party multiple times and suggested starting the project as soon as possible

In addition, the local government will further connect with departments such as chambers of commerce and overseas Chinese federations, and seek third-party cooperation through investment promotion activities to jointly promote project revitalization and enhance the city's image