(Yicai Global) Sept. 12 -- China plans to complete its national registry for rare diseases by 2020, including over 50 types of malady and over 50,000 cases for research, Science and Technology Daily reported, quoting Yang Shuyang, vice president of Peking Union Medical College Hospital.

The research will help deepen the country's understanding of accurate clinical manifestation and natural evolution of rare diseases, paving the way for disease intervention research, the report added.

Some 59 types of rare disease will be included in the system at first, divided into four categories: those relating to the heart, lungs and kidneys; those affecting the endocrine, metabolic and hematologic systems; neuro-skeletal and skin diseases and illnesses affecting children.

Rare diseases were progressively registered in the proposed system from a clinical perspective to introduce a comprehensive system covering referral, consultation and diagnosis across the country in view of academic and clinical services, said Dr. Gong Mengchun, executive director of the National Rare Diseases Registry System.

The international community currently recognizes around 7,000 types of disease, making up 10 percent of human ailments. About 80 percent are caused by gene defects.

In 2010, the Chinese Medical Association's Chinese Society of Genetic Medicine named diseases with a prevalence rate of less than one in 500,000 or incidence rate in newborns less than one in 10,000 as rare diseases. However, the quantity of the patients with rare diseases isn't that low due to the country's large population.