The country’s output in quality health research is going from strength to strength, but can it overcome questions about the integrity of its publishing practices?
(1 Oct 2025) Increasing evidence suggests that the geographical centre of medical research might be moving, as the amount and quality of research produced by China’s research hospitals rises, and the United States’ grip on the sector loosens.
China increased its investment in science by more than 3,800% between 1996 and 2023, says Bilal Demirel, who studies science and innovation at the Rathenau Institute in The Hague, the Netherlands, and is now coming close to matching what the United States spends. With China currently increasing its annual R&D budget by 7% — while US funding looks set to fall under President Donald Trump — there is every chance China will lead on research investment in the coming years.
Thanks to this growing government support, some of China’s research hospitals are rapidly moving up the Nature Index rankings. But questions remain about the quality of research in the Chinese health-care sector, with some of its hospitals also topping global lists for retracted papers — and it is not yet clear how effective efforts to rein in the problem will be.
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