Does unequal economic development contribute to the inequitable distribution of healthcare resources? Evidence from China spanning 2001–2020

Abstract Background There is a dearth of research combining geographical big data on medical resource allocation and growth with various statistical data. Given the recent achievements of China in economic development and healthcare, this study takes China as an example to investigate the dynamic geographical distribution patterns of medical resources, utilizing data on healthcare resources from 290 cities in China, as well as economic and population-related data. The study aims to examine the correlation between economic growth and spatial distribution of medical resources, with the ultimate goal of providing evidence for promoting global health equity. Methods The data used in this study was sourced from the China City Statistical Yearbook from 2001 to 2020. Two indicators were employed to measure medical resources: the number of doctors per million population and the number of hospital and clinic beds per million population. We employed dynamic convergence model and fixed-effects model to examine the correlation between economic growth and the spatial distribution of medical resources. Ordinary least squares (OLS) were used to estimate the β values of the samples. Results The average GDP for all city samples across all years was 36,019.31 ± 32,029.36, with an average of 2016.31 ± 1104.16 doctors per million people, and an average of 5986.2 ± 6801.67 hospital beds per million people. In the eastern cities, the average GDP for all city samples was 47,672.71 ± 37,850.77, with an average of 2264.58 ± 1288.89 doctors per million people, and an average of 3998.92 ± 1896.49 hospital beds per million people. Cities with initially low medical resources experienced faster growth (all β |βi|, i = 1, 2, 3, …, 9, all β doc: |βi|, i = 3, 4, 5, …, 10, P