Background Over the last few decades, the Chinese primary healthcare systemhas progressively weakened following economic liberalisation, rapid growth and changing consumer expectations. In 2009, the Chinese Government launched reforms to provide an essential public health service package’ for primary care activities, including hypertension and type 2 diabetes. Uptake of services varies and large quality gaps exist. Aims The overall goal of this five-year project is to strengthen primary health care systems to enhance uptake of the government’s essential public health services package for hypertension and type 2 diabetes in three diverse regions in China. Methods The SAPPHIRE study will be conducted in four phases, aligned with the Institute for Healthcare Improvement’s ‘Framework for Going to Full Scale’. Phase I (Understand): Rapid health system assessment to develop region- specific logic models. Phase II (Design): Develop a “change package” comprising of clin

Background Excess salt in the diet is associated with high blood pressure and increased risks of stroke, heart attack and kidney disease. This leads to serious health problems or premature death in hundreds of thousands of people in China every year. The problems with excess salt in take are particularly marked in China because food tends to be very salty. On average, Chinese people eat two and half times more salt each day than is recommended by the World Health Organization (WHO). Reducing salt in take has been clearly proven to lower blood pressure.Salt reduction is a focus for the Resolve To Save Lives (RTSL) initiative, which is commencing its salt reduction work in China.  Aims The overall goal of this five-year project is to support the implementation of the RTSL salt reduction program in China. Our work will help identify what works, what doesn’t and how to maximise impact on health with the resources available. Specifically, we will work with RTSL, the Chinese Center for