Directive of the Central Committee on Strengthening Health, Epidemic Prevention, and Medical Work (September 9, 1951)

To all Central Bureaus, and forward to Sub-bureaus, provincial, municipal, and district Party committees, prefectural committees, and county committees:
This report by Comrade He Cheng is very good. Upon receipt, you may publish it in internal Party publications to draw the attention of leading comrades at all levels. The Central Committee believes that the lack of attention paid by Party committees at all levels to health, epidemic prevention, and general medical work constitutes a major shortcoming in the Party's work and must be rectified. Henceforth, health, epidemic prevention, and general medical work must be regarded as a major political task, and every effort must be made to develop this work. Health workers must be given leadership and assistance. Health work must be inspected in a timely manner. In terms of funding, apart from what is listed in the central budget, every effort should be made to raise funds locally. Cadres must be educated so that they understand that, given the current situation, the annual losses in human and animal labor and economic terms suffered by the people nationwide due to illness and death caused by a lack of health knowledge and health work may exceed the annual losses suffered by the people nationwide from various calamities such as floods, droughts, windstorms, and insect pests. Therefore, health work must at least be regarded with the same importance as disaster relief and prevention work, and must absolutely not be underestimated.
Central Committee of the Communist Party of China
September 9, 1951
(Published based on Mao Zedong's manuscript.)

**Note**
Refers to the report on national epidemic prevention work submitted to the CPC Central Committee on September 7, 1951, by He Cheng, Party Secretary and Vice Minister of the Ministry of Health of the Central People's Government. The report summarized the achievements and remaining shortcomings in health work since the founding of New China, following the three principles of "facing workers, peasants, and soldiers; prevention first; uniting Chinese and Western medicine." It proposed that for epidemic prevention work to achieve its due effect, appropriate attention must be given by leading comrades of Party and government at all levels. However, many Party and government leading cadres below the provincial and county levels only consider preventing death by starvation as the government's responsibility, while paying insufficient attention to deaths caused by illness due to poor sanitation, regarding them as unavoidable "natural disasters." In reality, the number of deaths from epidemic diseases far exceeds those from starvation, and most of these are preventable.