With the rural population making up 80 percent of the population, whether benefit of reform can be extended to this group constitutes an important benchmark to gauge the success of China's economic development and social progress in the past decades.

The rural healthcare cooperative system that was initiated by the central government in 2002 is one of the steps the central authorities have taken to let rural villagers share in the yield of reform.

Statistics provided by the minister of health at yesterday's press conference show that more than 720 million or 84 percent of the rural population have joined the scheme, which is primarily meant to guarantee medical expenses for villagers to be hospitalized or have serious diseases treated. This system is popular with villagers.