The year 2019 witnessed a breakthrough in China's medical science. A committee of nearly 200 experts has identified 39 programs as major achievements for the year.

An announcement on Jan 13 from the Chinese Academy of Medical Sciences (CAMS) says the designations were made out of nearly 100,000 theses, registered new drugs, new equipment approved for production, as well as clinical trial data.

Wang Jianwei, deputy dean of the CAMS, said that many of them had drawn great attention from around the world.

"For example, we saw the first detailed analysis of the human embryo implantation process, and also witnessed high-level achievements in frontier bio-technologies like gene-editing," Wang said.

Wang noted that achievements were also made from drug development. Sodium Oligo-mannurarate (GV-971), which fights Alzheimer's disease, has been approved by China's National Medical Products Administration for market; and cancer drug Zanubrutinibis the first Chinese cancer drug that's been approved by the US Food and Drug Administration. Also developed and approved in China was Carrimycin, the world's first antibiotic created using synthetic biology that can be used in clinical treatments.

In addition, China released a new-generation artificial heart, a precision device for patients with end-stage heart failure.

Also, through large-scale epidemiological researches, China identified 45.7 million adult asthma patients for the first time. "These are important for our country to improve disease control policies", Wang added.

The annual announcement aims to display the country's medical technology development as China's encouraging innovation in all sectors.