Life expectancy grows amid improvements to city's medical services

The average life expectancy in Shanghai was 83.66 years of age last year, up from 83.63 in the previous year, the Shanghai Health Commission revealed on Friday.

The average life expectancy for local female residents was 86.14 years, and 81.27 for men, compared with 86.08 for women and 81.25 for men from a year earlier, the commission said.

Infant mortality was 3.06 per 1,000 babies, while maternal mortality was 3.51 per 100,000 deliveries, according to the commission.

"These figures have remained in a leading position across China and have aligned with developed countries for more than a decade," Zheng Jin, a spokeswoman for the Shanghai Health Commission, told a press conference on Friday.

"The city has established a network safeguarding public health and residents' health by improving medical treatment resource layout and promoting a healthy lifestyle," said Zheng.

By the end of last year, the city had 980 ambulances, a surge of 50.4 percent from 2016.

There was one ambulance for every 30,000 resident, and they could reach patients in 11.6 minutes on average in the first quarter of this year, compared with 12.4 minutes last year, and the time has been cut by nearly five minutes from 2016, the commission said.

Shanghai had 175 emergency rescue stations, a rise of 37.8 percent from 2016, and their average service radius had been shortened to 4 kilometers, down from 3.5 kilometers, according to the commission.

The city had registered 960 emergency rescue doctors by the end of last year, a surge of 71.4 percent from 2016.

Shanghai has established a rapid-response network for pregnant women and newborn babies in critical condition with 13 emergency rescue centers across the city, the commission said.

A project involving 26 ambulances for newborn babies enables cross-city transfer in the Yangtze River Delta region, and the successful rescue rate of pregnant women and newborn babies in critical condition reached 99 percent and 90 percent respectively in the city last year, according to the commission.

Shanghai residents are able to reach their nearest medical treatment point within 15 minutes because of the improved community health center network, and the city has nearly 10,000 general practitioners at present.

The number of medical institutions providing paediatric services grow to 276 in the city last year, from 234 in 2018.

Real-time monitoring of medical treatment on ambulances and an electronic medical record system have also been established in the city, the commission said.