In recent years, with the continuous improvement of residents' income levels and the accelerated upgrading of consumption structure, consumer demand is shifting from survival oriented to development oriented. Developing healthy consumption has become an important part of expanding domestic demand and improving people's livelihoods. The outline of the 15th Five Year Plan proposes to increase the proportion of development oriented consumption and cultivate and strengthen healthy consumption. At present, health consumption has expanded from traditional medical expenses to comprehensive consumption forms covering prevention, health management, and lifestyle. Its role in human capital accumulation, service industry quality expansion, and high-quality economic development is increasingly prominent. Grasping its connotation and mechanism from an economic perspective is an important prerequisite for understanding the direction of development oriented consumption and cultivating new growth drivers. In reality, health consumption is often simply equated with medical expenses, and even seen as passive "medical expenses". This understanding reflects its surface form, but does not touch upon its economic connotation. In fact, health consumption has a dual attribute. On the one hand, health is an important source of improving quality of life and happiness, and related expenditures are rational choices for improving quality of life and risk avoidance; On the other hand, health is an important component of human capital, directly affecting labor supply and productivity, and affecting income and output by extending labor participation time. The theory of human capital suggests that individual abilities depend not only on education and skills, but also on the stock of health capital. Due to the depreciation characteristic of health, continuous investment is required to maintain and enhance it. Therefore, health consumption is not only a current expenditure, but also a process of accumulating human capital with both consumption and investment attributes. It is an important manifestation of "investing in people", which is also an important reason why it is different from general consumption and included in the development oriented consumption category. Furthermore, health consumption presents a multi-level structure, including not only "risk response expenditures" such as medical services, but also "prevention and management expenditures" such as exercise, nutrition, and physical examinations, as well as "lifestyle expenditures" related to the environment, psychology, and behavior. This structure enables health consumption to run through the entire life cycle and cover diverse scenarios. Its core lies in continuously investing to enhance the health stock, thereby supporting the long-term improvement of individual abilities and quality of life. Due to its cross disciplinary complexity, health consumption is naturally embedded in the service consumption system and constantly expands the development boundaries of the service industry. From a temporal perspective, the role of health consumption is not limited to the current period. Unlike general consumption that focuses on immediate utility, health consumption affects labor supply and productivity through the accumulation of healthy human capital, and further affects economic growth. At the same time, the expansion of health consumption highly relies on service supply systems such as healthcare, wellness, health management, and sports and fitness. Therefore, health consumption is not just about expanding demand, but reshaping growth drivers, consumption structures, and industrial systems through multiple mechanisms, and its role can be understood from four aspects. One is to 'strengthen the foundation and cultivate the essence'. Enhance endogenous growth momentum by investing in people. Health consumption, as an important way to form healthy human capital, not only improves labor efficiency, prolongs labor participation cycles, and expands effective labor supply by improving health conditions, but also enhances the quality of human capital through complementary effects with education and skills, thereby consolidating the foundation of economic growth. The second is' reducing burden and releasing energy '. Release consumption potential through stable expectations. The uncertainty of health risks will strengthen preventive savings and suppress current consumption. With the increase of health investment and the improvement of the security system, the uncertainty of risks will decrease, consumption expectations will stabilize, the motivation for preventive savings will weaken, consumption tendencies will increase, and the shift from "risk constraint" to "consumption release" will be promoted. The third is "improving quality and expanding capacity". Drive the development of the service industry through demand upgrading. Health consumption is closely related to the development level of the service industry. Its growth is reflected not only in the scale expansion of medical, health care, health management and other fields, but also in the development of new formats such as remote medical and smart health promoted by digital technology. It can promote the transformation of the service industry from scale expansion to quality improvement, forming a cycle of "demand upgrading supply innovation industry evolution". The fourth is the combination of distance and proximity. Realize a cross period balance between short-term constraints and long-term returns. In the short term, health consumption may squeeze out some resources and have a certain crowding out effect on other consumption or investment; But as consumption shifts towards prevention and management, investment efficiency improves, health capital continues to accumulate and transform into higher quality labor supply, higher levels of human capital, and more stable consumption expectations, thus forming support for economic growth in long-term practice. Developing healthy consumption is an important measure to adapt to consumption upgrading and promote a virtuous cycle of social reproduction. To stimulate its endogenous driving force, it is necessary to coordinate the institutional environment, supply system, and development model, as well as to combine the inherent characteristics of healthy consumption to construct a development path that matches it. Firstly, improve supply and enhance quality, and solidify the consumption foundation through service upgrades. The expansion of health consumption is essentially a new requirement put forward by the upgrading of demand structure for service supply. We should focus on the health needs of the entire life cycle, promote the coordinated development of multiple business formats such as medical services, health care services, health management, and sports and fitness, and enhance the systematic and continuous supply of services. In line with the trend of digital technology development, accelerate the development of smart healthcare, remote health management, and personalized service models to improve supply efficiency and accessibility. Secondly, deepen integration and expand space, and unleash consumption potential in the linkage of business formats. The growth of health consumption is not limited to a single field, but constantly forms new growth spaces in the expansion of "health+". To promote the integrated development of health and elderly care, sports, cultural tourism, and digital economy, and cultivate a composite consumption form through scene reconstruction and model innovation. In this process, it is necessary to rely on the existing service system to achieve incremental expansion, and to empower new business models through technology, gradually forming an industrial linkage mechanism driven by health needs. Thirdly, improve institutional stability expectations and optimize the consumption environment through collaborative governance. The effective expansion of health consumption cannot be achieved without the support of the public service system. We should further improve the public health service system and multi-level health security system, and enhance the coverage and equalization of basic services. At the same time, we will improve health service standards and regulatory systems, regulate market order, enhance service quality and consumer confidence, and inject lasting momentum into healthy consumption. (Outlook on the New Era) Author: Zheng Lili (Professor at the School of Insurance, Central University of Finance and Economics)