China to promote law to regulate booming nursery care sector

China's top health authority reported on Wednesday that it is promoting the formulation of a national law on childcare services and has released a series of regulations and guidelines to regulate the booming sector of nursery care.

Yang Jinrui, deputy director of the National Health Commission's department of population surveillance and family development, said during a news conference that it is advancing the inclusion of a law on nursery care services into the legislative plans of the Standing Committee of the 14th National People's Congress, China's top legislature.

The commission has launched standards to regulate the establishment, management and official registration of nursery care facilities, as well as several guidelines to guide them to offer standard services.

China has been accelerating the development of the nursery care industry to address public needs to access affordable and trustworthy services to care for their children.

So far, China has around nearly 100,000 nursery care facilities, providing about 4.8 million nursery care slots, Yang said.

During the news conference, Mi Feng, spokesman of the commission, also said that by the end of last year, the infant mortality rate in the nation had dropped to 4.5 per 1,000 live births.

The mortality rate of children under 5 had dropped to 6.2 per 1,000, and the maternal mortality rate had dropped to 15.1 per 100,000.