Comrade Shangkun [1]: This document [2] is very good.
The proposal of the Party Group of the Ministry of Public Health is set forth in the last paragraph: henceforth, classes for Western-trained physicians to leave their posts and study traditional Chinese medicine should be organized under the leadership and responsibility of the party committees of each province, municipality directly under the central government, and autonomous region.
In my view, if each province, municipality directly under the central government, and autonomous region could establish one such class in 1958, accommodating seventy to eighty Western-trained physicians over a two-year period, then by the winter of 1960 or the spring of 1961 we would have approximately two thousand senior physicians trained in both Western and traditional Chinese medicine, among whom several outstanding theoreticians might emerge.
Please discuss this matter with Comrade Xu Yunbei [3] and draft a brief directive on behalf of the Central Committee [4] to forward the Ministry of Public Health’s report to the local party committees, requesting that they study it carefully and implement it accordingly.
The directive should emphasize that this is a major undertaking and must not be treated lightly.
Chinese medicine constitutes a vast treasure trove; we should make strenuous efforts to explore and further develop it.
After the directive and its accompanying document have been issued, they may be published in the People’s Daily.


Printed on October 11 by Mao Zedong, based on the Selected Letters of Mao Zedong, published by the People’s Publishing House in 1983.


Notes [1] Shangkun refers to Yang Shangkun (1907–1998), a native of Tongnan, Sichuan (now part of Chongqing Municipality). At that time he served as an alternate member of the Secretariat of the CPC Central Committee and Director of the General Office of the CPC Central Committee.  [2] Refers to the summary report submitted by the Party Group of the Ministry of Public Health to Mao Zedong and the Central Committee on September 25, 1958, concerning the organization of classes for Western-trained physicians to leave their posts and study traditional Chinese medicine.  [3] Xu Yunbei, born in 1914 in Liaocheng, Shandong Province. At that time he was Secretary of the Party Group of the Ministry of Public Health and Vice Minister of Public Health.  [4] On November 18, 1958, the CPC Central Committee issued a directive forwarding the Party Group of the Ministry of Public Health’s summary report on organizing classes for Western-trained physicians to leave their posts and study traditional Chinese medicine to the Shanghai Bureau and the party committees of all provinces, municipalities directly under the central government, and autonomous regions. This directive, together with the Party Group’s summary report, was published in the People’s Daily on November 20, 1958.