Guangdong province’s account book on the COVID-19 prevention and control was released at the 22nd meeting of the Standing Committee of the 13th Guangdong Provincial People’s Congress earlier this week. The account book shows that as of the end of June, the province’s financial anti-epidemic funds have exceeded 17.771 billion yuan, ranking second among all provinces and cities in China, according to the official WeChat Account of the government.
According to a staff member from the Guangdong Provincial Department of Finance, Guangdong activated the financial guarantee mechanism for public health emergencies immediately at the beginning of the COVID-19 outbreak, so as to effectively protect residents from high treatment costs and ensure all municipal and district government’s anti-epidemic policies would not be affected due to funding difficulties.
Guangdong’s audit department also stepped up supervision and verification of anti-epidemic funds. A special audit team has found a total of 868 issues in anti-epidemic special funds, donated funds and materials, subsidized loans for key enterprises, and production of anti-epidemic materials, according to the Guangdong Audit Office. As of June 15th, 727 issues have been rectified, with a completion rate of 83.76 percent.
In terms of the anti-epidemic materials, the audit office has urged and supervised the timely distribution of 72,399,600 materials and has corrected 172 problems arising from inadequate financial management of funds and materials and unstandardized management of procurement and storage. The audit has recovered about 16 million yuan of anti-epidemic funds and has regulated reserves of 93.95 million yuan worth of materials.
