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China suicide bus bombing wounds 31

Posted on: Monday, 8 August 2005, 07:17 CDT

By Benjamin Kang Lim

BEIJING (Reuters) - A 42-year-old farmer with terminal lung cancer set off a home-made bomb aboard a bus in southeastern China on Monday in a suicide attack that wounded 31, the official Xinhua news agency said.

Xinhua did not give a motive for the attack in central Fuzhou, capital of Fujian province, but it followed criticisms by senior health officials of health care costs that have risen beyond the means of many in rural areas.

The bomb was strong enough to blow out the windows of nearby stores, Xinhua said.

Pictures seen by Reuters showed rescue workers carrying victims on stretchers. One woman had deep cuts on her face, legs and abdomen, with part of her intestines spilling out. An unconscious man had black burns on his bloodied legs.

Xinhua did not identify the farmer.

Police declined to comment, but a local resident reached by telephone told Reuters that a woman who got off shortly before the explosion said she saw a man board the bus carrying a plastic container emitting smoke.

Bombings by social malcontents are common in China, where explosives are relatively easy to obtain, but most go unreported in the tightly-controlled state media.

UNSUCCESSFUL MEDICAL REFORM

Vice health minister Zhu Qingsheng said last December that about 50 percent of farmers could not afford to seek medical treatment when sick.

Last week, Health Minister Gao Qiang accused greedy hospitals of charging exorbitant fees and prescribing unnecessary and expensive medication, while the cabinet has called efforts to reform the medical system "basically unsuccessful."

In the late 1970s, 94 percent of China's villages were covered by cooperative medical schemes. As the collectives were disassembled during the market reforms of the 1980s, coverage rates fell to around seven percent.

The government has tried a variety of stop-gap insurance experiments, but many have faltered or failed due to fragmented bureaucracy, spotty regulation and funding shortfalls.

Today's medical care sector is composed of a confusing assortment of hospitals run by all levels of government, military and the private sector. In many rural areas, badly understaffed and under-supplied clinics offer the only health care.

Despite receiving fewer patients each year, revenues at Chinese hospitals jumped 70 percent between 2000 and 2003, according to state media.

The rise in the cost of health care has surpassed salary growth for the past eight years and many rural residents and those who migrate to cities looking for higher-paying jobs still have no medical insurance.

(Additional reporting by Vivi Lin)

Source: REUTERS

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