Wang Hang, Founder and CEO of Haodf Online, Elected as Member of the 12th CPPCC Ningxia Hui Autonomous Regional Committee, Advocates Deepening Innovation in Internet Healthcare
On January 8, 2023, the list of members of the 12th Ningxia Hui Autonomous Regional Committee of the Chinese People's Political Consultative Conference (CPPCC) was approved at the 32nd Meeting of the Standing Committee of the 11th Ningxia Hui Autonomous Regional CPPCC. Wang Hang, founder and CEO of Haodf.com, was elected as a member of the 12th Ningxia Hui Autonomous Regional CPPCC Committee.
Wang Hang, a native of Zhengzhou, Henan Province, is a member of the Jiusan Society and serves on its Special Committee on Economics. He is also President of the Yinchuan Internet+ Healthcare Association, a member of the Executive Committee of the Beijing Federation of Industry and Commerce, and the Founder and CEO of Haodf.com. A veteran entrepreneur in the internet healthcare sector, Wang graduated from Henan Medical University in 1993 with a degree in Preventive Medicine. In 2006, he founded Haodf.com, focusing on innovation in internet healthcare and committed to enhancing medical efficiency through internet technologies to safeguard public health.
“Internet + Healthcare” is a sector in which Ningxia holds a nationally leading advantage. In 2018, Ningxia established China’s first “Internet + Healthcare” demonstration zone, introducing substantial high-quality medical resources from Beijing, Shanghai, and other regions into Ningxia. This initiative has effectively addressed the shortage of premium medical resources in central and western China, paving a new path to resolving challenges such as “difficulty in accessing medical care” and “poverty caused by illness.” After nearly five years of development, Ningxia has gained first-mover advantages in industrial clustering, model exploration, and regulatory innovation.
How to continuously promote and deepen innovation in internet-based healthcare, expand its application scenarios within communities, enable the public to access internet healthcare services more conveniently, and thereby scale up the internet healthcare industry has long been a key concern for the government. Wang Hang offered his answer:
It is recommended that Ningxia, with community medical and health institutions in Yinchuan as the main body, establish a “Community Medical and Health Service Innovation Pilot Platform” covering a population of 2 million and open to innovative enterprises. This platform should attract leading companies nationwide in the “Internet + Medical Health” sector to conduct pilot projects in Ningxia, thereby directly benefiting the public while providing robust policy support and enterprise services to encourage them to locate their innovation pilots in Ningxia and expand their business operations across China.
In response to this suggestion, Wang Hang explained that the Yinchuan Municipal Health Commission had already considered this idea prior to the pandemic, but it was put on hold due to the outbreak. The rationale behind raising this issue was the recognition that, in an aging society, the primary scenarios for healthcare services would be within communities and patients’ homes. Given that primary care institutions at the community level lack specialized medical expertise, the most appropriate solution is to leverage internet-based technologies to remotely access expert resources from higher-level hospitals and engage them online in addressing primary care challenges. Therefore, the community-level service market is destined to become the largest and most promising segment for “Internet + Healthcare” initiatives.
However, “Internet + Healthcare” services that can be delivered to communities and homes are still in the exploratory phase of their business models. Innovative enterprises urgently need “testing grounds,” yet many find it extremely difficult to identify suitable pilot communities for their operations. Ningxia boasts a solid foundation in its primary healthcare system, and its industry regulators have accumulated substantial experience in innovation management. As such, Ningxia is well-positioned to serve as an innovation hub for the sector, attracting relevant companies to conduct pilots and launch startups in the region. This approach would simultaneously help substantially expand the scale of Ningxia’s “Internet + Healthcare” industry.
In terms of specific implementation, Wang Hang suggests allowing innovative enterprises in the “Internet + Healthcare” sector to conduct compliant pilot business collaborations with community healthcare institutions in Yinchuan. These collaborations would reference the cooperative model used by third-party internet healthcare platforms to establish internet hospitals in partnership with Yinchuan’s medical institutions, thereby providing third-party medical and health services to community residents and ensuring they are the primary beneficiaries. Meanwhile, it is recommended that the government establish a dedicated task force to coordinate with relevant departments and provide comprehensive support for companies establishing operations in Ningxia. This would enable businesses to operate with ease, comfort, and confidence, allowing them to focus more intently on business innovation and development, so that innovation truly benefits the local population.