To help students understand the latest discipline developments and help them stay informed of the health issues of social concern, the Faculty of Health and Wellness (FHW) at City University of Macau (CityU) has launched the Health Lecture Series. The first lecture was held yesterday at the Ho Yin Convention Centre, Taipa Campus, featuring Zhao Ping, a senior expert and the chairperson of the geriatric oncology professional Committee of the Chinese Association of Gerontology and Geriatrics, who shared insights on the theme “The Call of the Health Industry.” Attending the event were Executive Associate Dean Sun Pei of the Faculty of Health and Wellness, Associate Professor Ge Mei, Assistant Professor Xia Weiwei, and about 130 faculty and students from various departments.
Prof. Zhao Ping elaborated on three aspects: the background of how health became a major national strategy; the role of the health industry as a pillar in national and social development; and insights on oncology and strategies for prevention and control. He stated that China had currently achieved steady progress in ensuring people’s access to childcare, education, employment, medical services, elderly care, housing, and social assistance, leading to an overall improvement in people’s lives.
In the health strategy, it was essential to integrate health into all policies, promoting shared benefits among the people. Prof. Zhao emphasized that people’s health had to be prioritized in development strategies, reasoning that without “health for all,” there would be no moderate prosperity.
Prof. Zhao outlined five strategic tasks: popularizing healthy lifestyles, optimizing health services, improving health security, building a healthy environment, and developing the health industry. He highlighted that China had entered a new historical period and emphasized the importance of advancing the development of “Healthy China” as a national strategy to enhance the health quality of the Chinese nation and achieve coordinated development between people’s health and the economy. He noted that the current period was a crucial strategic opportunity for promoting the construction of a “Healthy China.”
Prof. Zhao Ping prioritized health as the foremost aspect of life and the greatest productivity in society, with the health industry being a key growth point for the economy. He regarded the health industry as a preferred choice considering current industrial upgrades, mentioning that the rapid growth and significant expansion of this industry created a robust and sustainable health market.
In addition, Prof. Zhao mentioned that public health had become a shared responsibility and action for the nation, society, individuals, and families, stressing the need for top-level government to integrate multi-faceted collaborative policies across departments, industries, and systems to ensure the continuous improvement of public health in China. He emphasized that the Healthy China initiative represented a shift from a disease treatment-centered approach to one focused on health promotion, involving changes in related systems and resource allocation. Therefore, individual behaviors, lifestyles, and social environments became weighted factors in health security, stressing the need for a comprehensive governance approach that considered the broad, social, and holistic nature of health determinants.
Prof. Zhao Ping discussed the growing aging issue in China, mentioning that pensions, elderly healthcare systems, and the management of elderly individuals were concerns for strategic national development, and the elderly caring models also evolved from the traditional family-based approach to institutional and community care. He mentioned a need to explore new models that integrate medical care and elderly support in the future.
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The Faculty of Health and Wellness (FHW) was established in 2024. It is the first professional education and academic institution in the nation, and possibly in the world, named after the concept of “Big Health.” Currently, FHW offers bachelor’s and master’s programs in Social Work, as well as master’s and PhD programs in Applied Psychology. This lecture aimed to help faculty and students understand the current state of medical development and to promote interdisciplinary and academic exchange. Going forward, FHW will continue to organize a series of lectures, inviting more stellar scholars to share their insights, jointly advancing research and exploring avenues for health advancement, injecting new momentum into the special administrative region’s “1+4” diversified industrial development strategy.
