China’s "black clinics" flourish as government debates health reform

By Hui Li and Ben Blanchard BEIJING (Reuters) – A one-room shack with a single, bare light bulb on a non-descript Beijing side street is 29-year-old Chinese migrant worker Zhang Xuefang's best recourse to medical care. Not recognized as a Beijing resident, she does not qualify for cheaper healthcare at government hospitals, and her hometown is too far away to take advantage of medical subsidizes there. Like millions of other migrant workers, Zhang, on whose labor China's economic boom depends, is forced into a seedy and unregulated world of back ally "black clinics" if she falls ill. …