China News Service, Haikou, September 25 (Reporter Fu Yuqun) "Artificial intelligence + medical health is at a historical turning point from technical verification to system integration. The customs closure operation of Hainan Free Trade Port provides this integration with a unique national system opening test ground and scenario implementation opportunity." 202 held in Haikou on the 24th At the fifth salon event of the 6-year "15th Five-Year Plan: Concentrate on Free Trade Port", Fang Zhongqi, a member of the Peasants' and Workers' Party and director of the Subject and Technology Department of Hainan Yiling Medical Technology Group, made suggestions for the "Hainan Path of Medical AI" and "let medical AI truly move from system opening to scenario implementation."
Trends of the Times and Hainan’s Opportunities Overlay
Currently, artificial intelligence is profoundly reshaping the global medical and health industry landscape. Medical AI shows great application potential in auxiliary diagnosis, health management, digital therapy and other fields. A set of data outlines the wave of the times: in 2025, AI will dominate global digital health financing. In the second quarter alone, start-ups focusing on AI captured 69% of the investment share in this field, with cumulative financing for the year exceeding US$12.3 billion. The global AI medical market size is expected to reach US$55.7 billion in 2026.
For Hainan, the opportunities are particularly concrete. After the island-wide customs closure of the Hainan Free Trade Port was launched on December 18, 2025, the coverage of "zero-tariff" goods increased to 74% of tax items; Hainan took the lead in promulgating "Several Measures to Support the High-Quality Development of the Digital Therapy Industry" and listed medical health as one of the seven key application areas in the "Artificial Intelligence +" action plan (2026-2028), and proposed the construction of national-level pilots such as "three medical" health data sets and trusted data spaces.
As the forefront of the country's reform and opening up, the Hainan Free Trade Port has the advantage of system flexibility after customs closure and the policy space of "pioneer and trial". It has taken the lead in the field of digital therapy. The review time limit has been reduced to 20 working days, and the fastest time for products from outside the province to be imported is 5 working days, forming the "Hainan speed" that is scarce in the country.
Six dimensions of collaborative efforts
However, medical AI also faces real bottlenecks such as long approval cycles, lack of standard systems, fragmented application scenarios, and lack of comprehensive talents. In Fang Zhongqi’s view, collaborative efforts can be made from the six dimensions of system, funding, standards, ecology, cross-border, and talent to build a “Hainan Path” for the development of medical AI.
"System first", he suggested that relying on the institutional advantages after the free trade port was closed, the "regulatory sandbox" mechanism should be introduced into the medical AI field, and a "registration system + post-supervision" sandbox access mechanism should be implemented for AI-assisted diagnosis and health management products with controllable safety risks and clear clinical value, allowing pilot trials in limited medical institutions and community scenarios, and then deciding whether to fully register after accumulating real-world data, and extending "Hainan Speed" to the field of AI medical software and intelligent hardware.
In terms of funding, Fang Zhongqi proposed to set up a "Special Fund for Medical AI Scenario Innovation" to provide subsidies of 30% of the purchase amount for approved AI products purchased by hospitals, health care communities, and grassroots institutions, and to provide subsidies for enterprises to carry out research and development of health intelligence, medical large models, etc. based on 20% of the annual investment, and to promote the joint investment of social capital through "invest first and then share".
Currently, AI medical standards are mostly concentrated in hospital scenarios, while community health management standards are almost blank. Fang Zhongqi suggested taking the lead in formulating local standards for community digital health services to form a replicable and exportable "Hainan standard" to enhance cross-border applicability under the open pattern of the free trade port facing ASEAN.
Build a “Digital Health Service Export Base” for ASEAN
Regarding the construction of industrial ecology and talent base, Fang Zhongqi believes that the "green channel" of digital therapy can be upgraded to a "full category acceleration package" covering AI medical devices, health intelligence, and intelligent hardware, and an "AI+ medical and health product registration service special class" can be established, and it can be pioneered in Hainan Ecological Software Park or Boao Lecheng International Medical Tourism The district has established a "Medical AI Product Concept Verification Center" to form a magnet effect for industrial agglomeration; it has established a provincial-level "Medical AI Application Talent" professional title assessment channel and training special project to promote the identification of new professions such as "Health Intelligence Applicant", and rely on the first-age training system and the Boao Base to build a "Hainan Medical AI Application Talent Training Base".
Based in Hainan, he also hopes to set his sights on a broader market: taking advantage of the facilitation of cross-border flow of elements after customs closure, under the framework of the "Cross-border Services Trade Negative List", list "community digital health management services" as a pilot export category to build a "digital health service export base" for ASEAN.
"Medical AI is an important intersection of system innovation and industrial upgrading of the Hainan Free Trade Port." Fang Zhongqi hopes to take the opening of the system as the forerunner, the implementation of scenarios as the traction, the standard output as the feature, and the cross-border channel as the expansion, to form a six-in-one development pattern of "system-funding-standard-ecology-cross-border-talent", build Hainan into a national medical AI system innovation highland, and move AI digital health from "system online" to "service implementation."
