China's $9.2 billion precision medicine initiative could see about 100 million whole human genomes sequenced

The Chinese Academy of Sciences has issued invitations to apply for funding for projects under the China Precision Medicine Initiative (PMI), a US$9.2-billion, 15-year project announced during the National People’s Congress sessions in March, 2016.

China has enlisted the private sector as well as government resources in its bid to make the country a leader in “precision medicine,” a proposed model for the treatment of diseases tailored to individual patients based on their genetic makeup.

The first step will be to assemble a database of genomic data from the Chinese and international populations. A cross-disciplinary team coordinated by the Beijing Institute of Genomics will first collect genetic information from about 2,000 volunteers and aim to develop new treatment concepts.