Advertisement
Hong Kong patients want faster, cheaper treatments. Now they’re flocking to mainland China
- Long waiting times for public healthcare services, high drug prices in Hong Kong send residents across the border
Reading Time:8 minutes
Why you can trust SCMP
27
Hong Kong retiree Donika Liu leaves her home in Tsuen Wan at 8am and starts a 90-minute train journey across the border to Shenzhen.
Advertisement
At the University of Hong Kong–Shenzhen Hospital in Futian, she sees a doctor and collects a month’s supply of a targeted therapy drug for her cancer.
She is done by noon, and then begins her journey home.
“I make these long, arduous trips across the border to get life-saving medication I cannot afford in Hong Kong,” 59-year-old Liu said.
Single and living alone, she quit her job in social services after she was diagnosed with lung cancer more than two years ago.
Advertisement