AbstractBackgroundWHO focused and gave priority on ten serious tropical diseases, while China has made remarkable achievements on tropical diseases control. In addition, China has a history of more than 60 years in the health assistance, however, its assistance for tropical diseases started late.MethodsA qualitative questionnaire was distributed to inquiry the opinions of professionals on China’s health assistance on tropical diseases and published articles were searched to collect those data. SWOT analysis, as a tool of qualitative analysis, was used to classify and evaluate the current strengths, the weakness, the opportunities, and the threats of health assistance on tropical diseases in China.ResultsBased on SWOT analysis, the internal factors and external environments are obtained. The strengths are focused on China’s achievements on tropical diseases control, surveillance response system of tropical diseases, and human resources of public health; the weakness laid on sustainability of aid projects and funding, applicability of Chinese experience, and lack of composite talents; the opportunities are mainly in the global need of tropical diseases control, China’s health cooperation in Belt & Road and Africa, and the actively participating of international organizations in health assistance; as well as the threats are reflected in the complex international situation, domestic needs of tropical diseases control, and the significant gaps between China and developed countries.ConclusionThe internal strengths and weaknesses of development assistance for health on tropical diseases are clearly presented in the SWOT framework, as well as the external opportunities and threats and corresponding coping strategies. In the era of global health, China should strengthen and improve the health assistance for tropical diseases.Author summaryTropical diseases are serious infections in tropical and sub-tropical regions, with billions of persons infected and millions of deaths every year, especially in Africa. WHO also called for global efforts to control and eliminate tropical diseases. In the era of global health, development assistance on tropical diseases is important to demonstrate the soft power of national diplomacy, and China has started its health assistance in 1963. In this paper, a qualitative questionnaire and published articles were combined to collect data, and then SWOT analysis was used to analyze the internal factors and external environment, that is the current strengths, the weakness, the opportunities, and the threats of the China’s Health Assistance on key tropical diseases. Based on those results, we put forward the countermeasures and suggestions for the future cooperation of tropical diseases. At the end of this paper, we call on Chinese professionals should make use of their own advantages and actively improve the global tropical diseases control.
China’s Development Assistance for Health on Key Tropical Diseases: A SWOT Analysis
