Top health authority: Immunotherapy to be conducted only for research purposes

The top health authority vowed to further strengthen regulation and supervision over hospitals and anyone caught violating existing rules will be severely punished, said an online statement issued by the National Health and Family Planning Commission Thursday.

The commission held a teleconference on Wednesday and delivered the tough message to heath officials in administration and management at province, city, and county levels nationwide following a joint investigation into a military cancer clinic where a young man died after receiving the allegedly hyped immunotherapy.

The statement said the immunotherapy must be practiced in China only for scientific research purposes, not commercial clinical use. The treatment that the young man Wei Zexi received is called DC-CIK, a type of the immunotherapy.

Also, the practices for public hospitals subcontracting certain departments to private practitioners are prohibited, it said.

An overhaul into the sector was ordered at the teleconference as well. "The regulation has to be strictly enforced to better secure public health," it said.