The elderly in the seniors' home at Laoximen community, Shanghai, gather together and enjoy Chongyang cakes made by children. [Photo by Yang Yi/For China Daily]

China's National Health Commission (NHC) said it will encourage and support more provinces, municipalities and autonomous regions to offer paid leave for only children to care for their hospitalized parents.

The NHC said in a statement that this new form of paid leave helps enhance elderly care services for families with only children and protects their legal rights.

Central China's Henan province implemented a paid leave policy for only children to care of hospitalized parents in 2016. It was followed by at least 10 other provinces.

The length of such paid leave varies among provinces. Henan allows 20 days at best every year to take care of parents in hospital while the 10 other provinces grant paid leaves of 10 to 15 days every year, according to Beijing News.

Some provinces mandate that the paid leaves are granted only when hospitalized parents are over 60 years.

 "We will work with human resources and social security authorities to conduct more follow-up research on such leave and step up supervision of policy implementation," the NHC's statement said.

Recognizing that the 11 provinces have provided a model to emulate for other regions across China, the NHC statement encouraged more provinces to implement the policy. More official guidance will be issued to prevent widening of the regional policy gap so that the new measure can reach more families with only children, the NHC statement said.

Observers said companies might dither to accept the measure as the paid leave for only children will be longer than the annual paid leave. “It is understandable that paid leave for only children will not be well-accepted among companies,” said Yantian, an expert in labor law at Peking University Law School.

Professor Wang Xu of Renmin University Law School suggested that government can provide incentives for enterprises strictly enforcing the policy. Besides, foundations can be set up or insurance cover introduced to spread the cost now borne by enterprises.

In response to suggestion by several legislators that such paid leave be made a national regulation, NHC said it will propose that to the legislature after taking into account factors such as level of socioeconomic development and labor cost of the policy.