The National Healthcare Security Administration has required that interprovincial settlement of outpatient service fees be allowed nationwide by the end of 2021, in an official document recently published by the administration.

As early as September 2018, East China's Zhejiang had already started implementing a system that allows the province's medically insured citizens to use Zhejiang-issued social security cards when receiving outpatient services in Shanghai, and vice versa.

As of Sept 30 this year, a total of 2,137 Zhejiang-based medical institutions are allowing the use of social security cards issued in any Chinese province or municipality to pay for hospital expenses, and 2,101 Zhejiang-based medical institutions are allowing the use of social security cards issued in the Yangtze River Delta region (which consists of Zhejiang, Jiangsu, and Anhui provinces as well as Shanghai municipality) to pay for inpatient service charges.

Chen Yuehua, a 66-year-old Shanghai resident, was interviewed by local media correspondents while swiping her Shanghai-issued social security cards at a self-service machine in the Jiaxing Hospital of TCM, located in Jiaxing city, Zhejiang province. Chen told correspondents that she was born and raised in Jiaxing and moved to Shanghai years ago. After she retired, she would often come back to Jiaxing to visit relatives, and being able to pay for medical expenses using her Shanghai-issued card has made it easy for her to seek treatment whenever needed.

"The system gives me a greater sense of belonging to the community," said Peng Yong, a Jiangsu-born construction worker currently residing in Hangzhou, capital of Zhejiang province, to local reporters. The nearest community hospital to his apartment started to fully accept the use of YRD-issued social security cards last August, benefiting hundreds of people like Peng who have just moved to the area from other provinces in the YRD region.