In January, a European Commission investigation concluded that there was “clear evidence of China limiting access by EU medical device producers to its government contracts in an unfair and discriminatory way”.
According to Brussels, Chinese medical device manufacturers have largely free access to public procurement tenders in the EU market, compared to the restrictions faced by European competitors in China.
The EU probe singled out Beijing’s “Buy China” policies – particularly in the high-end segment of the medical device sector – as designed “to directly favour domestic medical devices to the detriment of imported ones”.
It noted that the devices were among the 10 designated under the Made in China 2025 programme, with targets for domestically produced products to account for half of all those used in county hospitals by 2020, 70 per cent by 2025 and 90 per cent by 2030.
