Sinosplice had what I thought this was a great piece of insight on Chinese hospitals:

“…Chinese train stations and Chinese hospitals are very similar.

• Both serve huge numbers of people
• Both contain a wide cross-section of society
• Both involve a lot of helpless waiting and nerve-wracking purchases
• Both offer VIP options which offer English-language services and a quieter, more private atmosphere
• Both leave you with a sense of wonder and hopelessness at the magnitude of the problems heaped on a government which has to provide for 1.3 billion people.

(I can also totally understand why many of the doctors and nurses had attitudes scarcely better than train station ticket vendors.)”

As some in the comments pointed out, it’s not just that hospitals look like train stations, but also like bus stations and any other understaffed high demand public services.  Of course, health reform has kicked off, and releasing some of this pressure on hospitals is a primary focus of that effort.

Still, there is something to be said for the ultimate inefficiency of a system that funds all public services from a single budget and tries to do so equitably.  For some reason, historically, health has been viewed by all revolutionary governments as something that needs to be taken care of only after the ‘real’ issues of statehood, like economy, political legitimacy, and military build up, are solved, or at least brought to  acceptable equilibrium.   That’s why it is common to see crowded, unsanitary, and corrupt health systems in the middle of bustling world centers like Shanghai, Brazil, New York…etc.  Eventually this mistake in policy catches up with you.

If you think I’m overgeneralizing, just name me a country with over 60 million people, which has healthcare outcomes on par with its economic prosperity.  In other words, of the most populous countries with 60 million people or more, who’s ranking as an economic power (a measure of development) is equal to or lower than their health indicators?  Chances are you’ll find only two no matter how you measure outcomes – France and Japan.  Then again, both of these countries were stable regional and global powers for a combined period of 1000 years who were forced to curtail their ambitions after their economic expansions were thwarted in various  military engagements, so they have had a while to focus on health.