The level of benefit coverage is modest, as indicated in
Table 2. For example, the reimbursement rate of inpatient
care was relatively low in 2011, ranging from 44 to 68%
among the three public insurance programs, all of which
left the insured to bear a relatively large share of the burden
of inpatient care. The low benefit level was a direct
result of the modest premiums. Table 2 shows that the
annual premium was only US$24 and US$21 for NRCMS
and URBMI, respectively, both of which were too low to
offer any generous benefit coverage. Not surprisingly, the
publishedevidence is equivocal about whetherChina’s coverage
expansion reduced patients’ financial risk [48–53]. At
the national level,the proportion of out-of-pocket expenditures
to totalnationalhealthexpenditures was significantly
reduced from 60% in 2001 to 35% in 2011 (Fig. 1). However,
the proportion was still higher than the average level of
33% among the group of upper-middle-income countries,
to which China belong