Xi's speech at CIIE draws positive reactions

Vladimir Makatsaria, chairman of Johnson & Johnson China

I was heartened to hear President Xi's speech at the opening ceremony. His messages on the deepening of China's reform and opening-up, promoting trade liberalization and optimizing the business environment certainly give us great confidence for continuing to grow Johnson & Johnson in China.

As the world's largest healthcare company, with three major business areas - consumer products, pharmaceutical products and medical devices - and one that is guided by our credo to serve patients' unmet needs, we were very glad that President Xi also noted economic growth is to boost the well-being of all people.

In recent years, the Chinese government has been positive in deepening economic reform and opening trade. In the healthcare sector, the Chinese government has further opened its doors to global investment and is building a patient-centered and pro-innovation healthcare system.

We welcome the many additional healthcare system reform proposals made in the last six months and hope these policies will be implemented as quickly as possible to further accelerate patients' access to innovative medicines. Chinese patients are now getting earlier access to innovative medicines and we congratulate the Chinese government on becoming an official regulatory member of the International Council on Harmonization (ICH), which is an important step that will bring Chinese clinical trials even closer to international standards.