About 6.8% of China's population has the disease, world's highest proportion

China has a huge diabetes problem but its hospital-centered medical care system undermines effective intervention in the rapidly rising chronic disease, a top specialist said.

"In addition to funding, the government should greatly improve its primary care capacity to better care for the multitude of diabetes and other chronic disease patients," Ji Linong, president of the Chinese Diabetes Society, under the Chinese Medical Association, said in Beijing.