More and more Chinese learning, using traditional Chinese medicine

An increasing number of Chinese people are learning about and using traditional Chinese medicine, the National Administration of Traditional Chinese Medicine said on Monday.

About 20.7 percent of Chinese people were considered literate in the field of TCM last year, up by nearly 8 percentage points from around 2016, according to the administration.

Meanwhile, local governments have stepped up TCM services.

Zhang Ping, head of the health commission of Zhejiang province, said during a briefing on Monday that 90 percent of community or rural health clinics can provide at least four types of TCM services.

He added that in the next five years, Zhejiang will invest 24.5 billion yuan ($3.8 billion) into renovating or building TCM health institutions.

In Shandong province, over 99 percent of community health service centers or township-level health centers, as well as 80 percent of village-level health clinics are capable of providing TCM services, said Zhuang Yan, deputy director of the province's health commission.

Xu Qingfeng, deputy director of the health commission of Guangdong province, said the number of TCM health institutions in the province has reached 23,000 as of recently.

He added that the annual number of TCM medical visits had exceeded 200 million, accounting for about 25 percent of total medical visits across the province each year.