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Comprehensive regulations are in place in the public sector to protect patient safety and
enhance efficiency. These measures, however, are less prominent in the private sector. The
practice of private physicians is mainly under the supervision of the Medical Council of
Hong Kong (MCHK) and the Department of Health (DH) under physicians’ affiliated
institutions according to the newly passed Cap. 633 Private Healthcare Facilities Ordinance
(Box 4.2) which started in January 2021. This legislation has already been criticised for its
lack of regulation on broader areas such as pharmacies and it has been resisted by
professionals in the private healthcare sector. Regulation in the private sector will be a key
issue to address in order to implement the Scheme successfully.

Stakeholders’ voices

We have a lot of so-called supervision, regulation, monitoring systems,
audit systems in the public sector, but we never have those in private
hospitals or in private practices. They are just governed by the
professional Councils and then it (the governance) is very [regressive].
NGO representative

Hong Kong’s private doctors essentially are very powerful,
and they will resist all kinds of regulation, both from the
insurance company or the Government.
Academic

The Department of Health will start to regulate private
hospitals, day surgery centres and clinics step-by-step
starting January 2021. However, they will just regulate the
structural component. They are not going beyond that to
other areas such as drug sales and distribution, information
and data privacy, etc. The Government should also think
about how to coordinate its regulatory actions.
Academic

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