HONG KONG — Chief Executive John Lee announced a series of government initiatives to develop Hong Kong into a health and medical innovation hub at the opening of the sixth Asia Summit on Global Health on Tuesday. The two-day summit, themed "Fuelling Healthcare Breakthroughs," brought together more than 90 speakers from 15 countries and regions, including Nobel Prize Laureate in Chemistry Professor Michael Levitt, who is scheduled to speak at the Dialogue with Global Pioneer in Health session.

"Our status as a leading hub for scientific innovation is unrivalled in Asia," Lee said. "Our strengths are magnified by our core position in the Guangdong-Hong Kong-Macao Greater Bay Area."

The National 15th Five-Year Plan sets the goal of developing Hong Kong into a health and medical innovation hub, optimizing an evaluation and approval mechanism for innovative drugs and supporting their clinical application. The Greater Bay Area integrates 11 cities in southern China and has an economy comparable to that of the world's 10th-largest nation.

Hong Kong is expanding its clinical trial capabilities to support biomedical research and development from the laboratory to the bedside. The Greater Bay Area International Clinical Trial Institute, located in the Hetao Shenzhen-Hong Kong Science and Technology Innovation Co-operation Zone, anchors that expansion. The institute and its Shenzhen counterpart operate under an integrated "one institute, one centre" model, drawing on the region's combined population of more than 87 million to coordinate multi-center, cross-boundary clinical trials that meet national and international standards. The institute is wholly government-owned and operated by the University of Hong Kong's medical faculty, and serves as a one-stop agency for medical research and development institutions worldwide.

In December 2025, Hong Kong launched the Greater Bay Area Clinical Trial Collaboration Platform and set up the Real-World Study & Application Centre. The platform offers expert consultation on medicine, statistics, regulatory affairs, and ethics, while the centre uses local medical data to generate real-world evidence supporting drug and medical device registration in Hong Kong and on the Mainland.

Hong Kong's "1+" mechanism allows new drugs to be registered after approval from one recognized reference authority, with supporting local clinical data. In March 2026, the city began the phased implementation of "primary evaluation" for new drug registration, with full implementation targeted by 2030. "That will put Hong Kong on the map as a trusted hub for regulatory excellence," he said.

Hong Kong is also establishing the Life & Health Technology Research Institute at the Hong Kong-Shenzhen Innovation and Technology Park, with three branches to be set up by local universities. Preparatory work is expected to be completed in 2026. Under the InnoHK initiative, two research clusters have collaborated with more than 30 universities and research institutes from 12 economies and involve more than 3,000 researchers, with 16 centres focusing on healthcare-related technologies including biomedicine, chemistry, engineering, and artificial intelligence.

Attendees included medical professionals, government officials, pharmaceutical and health-tech representatives, investors, and entrepreneurs. "In an age of complex health challenges, progress is powered by collaboration," he said.